burdens, why should we bend our free shoulders to take on the heavy load? Of all the ironies of history, it is one of the most melancholy and unique that at a moment when the Czar of all the Russias, countries semi-barbarous, is pleading for a general disarmament, we of America, who, in the century and a quarter since we declared our independence, have had more than 100 years of peace, should now be panting to 'cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war.' Have we found war so beautiful a thing in these last months that we have become enamored of it? If our greater America does not mean frequent war it must mean costly military occupation; costly in human life as well as in silver and gold. Thousands of our young men, without the inspiration of that great humanitarian impulse which swept them into the ranks six months ago, will have to go forth to these new possessions, to intellectually and morally decay, to suffer and to die, after the manner of all temperate zone people attempting to develop tropical countries.. No! No! We may appreciate all the courage and all the patience and long suffering of our soldiers and our sailors at their several posts of duty and danger, but those of us who had forgotten that 'war is hell' have learned anew our lesson, and those who had no experience of it have now had enough. We shall not subvert our traditional policy just for the sake of being one of the great fighting nations of the earth. It may be some time yet before "The war-drums throb no longer,

And the battle-flags are furled
In the parliament of man,

The federation of the world ;

but hereafter, if I am not much mistaken, we shall invoke the dread arbitrament of war more seriously than in this event; we shall be more absolutely sure that it will be worth the cost, and that there is no other way, before we wade into the rushing stream of mingled blood and tears.

way

of

And now I come, too late, perhaps, to a conception of a Greater America, which is attractive to many of our most generous spirits. Such do not care for any swelling of our physical bulk, for any increment of our population. Nor do they care to have America shine as a great military and naval power, having some notion what that means in the monstrous burdens and miserable complications. Nor does the commercial argument appeal to them, especially when the possible advantages of colonial markets are weighed against the certain incidents of miscarriage and corruption that would inhere in the new order of affairs. But these generous spirits say -and I must confess that there is something in their views that should appeal to every humane personthat such a great nation as America ought to take its part in civilizing and elevating the inferior races of the world; that we ought not to leave all this hard and disagreeable business to other nations, however willing they may be to take it off our hands. "Be the cost ten times, a hundred times, the gain, to the nation or to the individuals, we will do all that we can to make these people happy, industrious, useful, self-respecting men and women, and in proportion to their intelligence and capacity, will admit them to

the conduct of their civil and political affairs. I cannot see why any person of just and honorable mind should flout this attitude and purpose as utterly irrational. It is indifferent to the philosophy of what might have been, which is never very fruitful of results. It starts from where we are. By whatever crookedness we got there, with whatever failure to redeem our promises, we are here with these various possessions actually or potentially in our hands. How can we," it is asked "permit these gardens of the world to revert into the rapacious and oppressive charge of a nation which has never done anything but abuse its opportunities from the time of Christopher Columbus until now?"

I answer, that if we are to hold these conquered lands in any way whatever it must be in some such high, unselfish way as this. If we should attempt to hold them for mere commercial exploitation, as some would have us do, the civilization of the world would shrivel from us like a snake skin and cast us out as a polluted thing. Colonization in any sincere and genuine meaning of the word is an impossibility. But has this humanitarian dream reckoned sufficiently with the concrete facts of our American political life? Has it considered whether we have a body of civil servants equal to the discharge of such duties as would be laid upon them? It is certain that we have not. Here would be the potentiality of going wrong beyond the dreams of any of the bosses who are now riding us with whip and spur. Here would be unlimited opportunities for such devil's work as we have had in the administration of our military departments of transportation and medicine and general supply. The proposed government of these dependencies would be particularly sensitive to Congressional control, and that means the distribution of places with little or no regard to personal fitness. Given such a management of Cuba and the Philippines as we have had of the War Department during the last six months and the last state of those territories would be worse than the first. And why has the management of the War Department been so intolerably bad? Simply because it has been conducted on the basis of Congressional politics, the place for him who has a "pull," who is somebody's brother or son or nephew or local adept in working "blocks of five" and things of that kind. But we are told that England has a body of civil servants in India and Egypt and in her crown colonies that is equal to its tasks, and we are also told that it is unpatriotic to for a moment doubt that we can do as well. I do not

question the average moral quality of the American people. But our government is not representative. I mean our governing bodies do not represent the homely virtues of our people. This is a stage of our development which we shall work through in time. As for England, she has waded through corruption to her present coign of vantage. She has got knowledge by experience. We, too, have made a good beginning. We have had plenty of experience. But untried conditions would afford a fearful opportunity for the old vice to breed again after its kind. Where the carcass was there would the vultures be gathered together.

to a

Again, in our dealings heretofore with inferior races there is absolutely nothing to encourage us. Our dealings with the Indians have been equivalent Century of Dishonor." And how about the blacks? Dces our disfranchisement of them by one contemptible artifice or another promise well for our treatment of the natives and half breeds of our new possessions? We have been credibly assured that the negroes of Cuba are used to better treatment than those of Georgia and Louisiana. Was our Southern reconstruction such that we can enter on a much harder field with hope of good success?'

The speaker closed by reverting to the threatened change in our traditional policy, and said the realization of the hopes for new territory would be difficult because of the new policy in which the nation is involved. Bigger armies and navies, he said, were inevitable, if such a policy were to be adopted, so adding new burdens to industry or by adding to our present area territories that will remain essentially foreign for centuries to come. There must be, he said, men of high character chosen for the new places, men of sincere convictions, consistent lives, indisputable integrity. He believed, however, that all will yet

be well.

The City Hall Clock.

THE great City Hall clock, of Philadelphia, is intended to commence marking time with the new year, 1899, or at midnight of next Twelfth month, 31st. Its dials, three hundred and seventy feet above the pavement, are twenty-two feet in diameter. A man standing on IX of the dial shows his head just above X. The dials are of glass, in order by electric light illumination with one hundred and fifty lamps to show the time by night, as well as by day. The minutehand is ten feet eight inches long, the hour-hand nine feet. Both hands together weigh four hundred pounds. Compressed air will be used to move them. It is said that the great town clock in Westminster Abbey, which is not quite so large as the City Hall clock, requires the services of two men four days to wind it. That clock strikes the hours, but this clock will not strike.”

"

The War-Tax "Stamps."

THE merchant pays the bulk of the war tax, the Farm Implement News says, and adds:

"He telegraphs for certain goods and stamps the message to the tune of one cent. He is sure the freight bill includes the tax that the railroad company pays on the bill of lading. Maybe it does not, but he thinks so and that is almost as distressing. He sells the goods to a customer and takes a note secured by mortgage. Of course the customer has no revenue stamps, so the merchant decorates the note to the extent of two cents a hundred. The acknowledgment of the mortgagor's signature calls for a ten-cent stamp. Shall he ask the poor notary, who only gets a pittance per acknowledgment, to pay this? If the mortgage is more than $1,000 it requires a twenty-five-cent stamp, and of course the merchant must furnish that.

"After awhile the bill comes due. He is a little short of funds and gets a loan at the bank. He gives his note and stamps it at the rate of two cents for each hundred dollars. The banker cannot afford to pay it, he says. Then a check is sent to the shipper and the merchant stamps that. Eventually the customer's note matures and he must have a renewal. This calls for more stamps for the new note and mortgage. Perhaps when his own note at the bank is due he must have an extension. If so, he stamps the renewal and the check he gives for the interest. By this time he gets impatient and stamps his foot. Then he wonders why he ever wanted his country to go to war.

Poison Ivy.

DURING the recent field-day of the Darlington Botanical Club, . of West Chester, Pa., one of the interesting side talks by Dr. Schmucker of the State Normal School related to poison ivy. For a long time, he said, scientists could not decide what is the active principle of the plant. After much study and investigation it was found that the substance which causes the inflammation and swelling is a non-volatile oil, not soluble in water, but easily dissolved in alcohol. Therefore, if a person bathe the affected parts in alcohol as soon as he finds that he has been poisoned no further harm or inconvenience need be feared.

Parted in the Middle.

AN amusing incident occurred a few days since at the Lenox home of a Boston family, says Harper's Round Table. They had urged some friends who were driving through the Berkshires to stop with them to lunch. This they were finally persuaded to do, a little girl three years old being of the party. Soon after they were all seated at the table, Mr. Ultradude, a guest in the house (a man of curling locks parted in the middle), appeared, and took his accustomed seat, which chanced to be just opposite the high chair occupied by Ethel. The child, after a glance or two at the new-comer, began to show symptoms of weeping, and a moment or two afterward burst into such a flood of tears that she had to by position, and so little of the cry-baby about her, that her Ethel has so bright and sunny a dismother felt justified in hastening after the nurse and child to know the cause of so unexpected an outbreak. When the little one could command her voice, she managed to confide to her mother between her sobs, "I's so 'fraid of that boy with a girl's head!"

taken from the room.

CURRENT EVENTS.

THE Peace Commissioners have continued their negotiations at Paris, and while there is no official announcement of the matters discussed, it seems to be fairly plain that up to this writing the Philippine Islands question has not been reached. There have been, it is said, sharp differences concerning Cuba, the Spaniards urging that the United States assume the debt of the island, or part of it. A Paris dispatch, on the 17th inst., says that the American commissioners "rejected the idea of accepting sovereignty over Cuba for the United States," and that the power of the latter would be used only to restore order and establish government. To this the Spanish rejoined that the exercise of such authority was sovereignty.

THE evacuation of Porto Rico by the Spanish was expected to be completed by the 18th inst., and the American flag to be formally raised at San Juan. In Cuba, the removal of the Spanish troops makes slow progress. Parrado, one of the Spanish commissioners in conference with the American commissioners at Havana, is quoted as saying that Spain had sought transport ships to remove her men, in all ports of "" If our moveEurope, but was too poor to secure them. ments are too slow," he said, "you will have to put us out.' It is suggested as likely that the United States will have to provide transportation.

A FRIGHTFUL marine accident occurred on the south coast of England, on the evening of the 14th instant. The steamship Mohegan, of the Atlantic Transport line, ran upon the rocks off the Lizard, about 7 p. m., and shortly sank. She was bound from London for New York. It is believed that 108 persons were drowned and only fifty saved. It is not explained how the ship was so far out of a safe

course.

THE War Investigating Commission left Washington on the 16th, to inspect all Southern camps. Testimony of officers will be taken. Orders for the movement of General Graham's

corps from Camp Meade, near Harrisburg, Pa., to camps in the South, have been revoked, owing to the prevalence of yellow fever at Southern points, and the soldiers will remain until cold weather arrives.

EMPEROR William of Germany left Berlin last week on his way to Constantinople and Jerusalem. In the latter city he will take part in the ceremony of dedicating a Protestant German church. It was reported that an Anarchist plot had been formed to assassinate him, while on the way, and numerous arrests were made. The Emperor is accompanied by the Empress and a number of officials. They reached Venice on the 13th inst., and proceeded the same day for Constantinople.

THE strikes in Paris appear to have subsided, and a dispatch on the 17th says the troops have been withdrawn from the yards and other places in which they have been stationed since disturbances were threatened. The agitation of the Dreyfus matter is less acute, but as the Chambers are about to resume their sessions soon, it must again revive. It seems doubtful whether there will be any "revision" of the trial, after all, and whether the Premier, M. Brisson, attempting to secure it will not cause his Ministry to "fall" by vote of the Chamber of Deputies.

TERRIBLE riots occurred at Virden, Illinois, on the 12th instant. A train load of " imported" negroes arrived to take the places of the striking coal miners, and this caused a battle between the Sheriff's deputies and the strikers. Thirteen men were killed and twenty-five wounded. Governor Tanner sent troops to the scene, instructing them to quell the riot and protect life and property, but not to allow any importation of negroes. He has freely expressed the opinion that the mine owners are responsible for the blood shed, and they declare him responsible.

THE political "campaigns" in Pennsylvania and New York continue very earnest and animated. In the former John Wanamaker began an extended speaking tour on the 17th instant, and the three candidates for governor, Stone Rep., Jenks, Dem., and Swallow, Ind., are all speaking daily. The result seems uncertain; there is no denial that a very large shift of voters has been made to Swallow, and those in charge of his campaign are confident of his election. In New York, Roosevelt, Rep., and Van Wyck, Dem., it is believed will have a close contest.

NEWS AND OTHER GLEANINGS. THE annual report of the United States Indian school at Carlisle, just prepared by Major (no longer Captain) Pratt, shows that there are 462 boys and 405 girls in the school, representing seventy-four tribes. During the year 1,080 have been on the roll. The number now in the school is 104 in excess of last year.

-The satisfactory announcement is made that several of the largest railroad companies in the country are planning to move for a reduction in sleeping-car rates. It is proposed to have all the roads in the country using Pullman cars unite in an appeal to this company to make a reduction in the rates charged for upper and lower berths in sleeping cars, and in the rates for seats in chair cars. The enormous profits of the Pullman Company, recently disclosed, will no doubt promote this movement.

-By an extraordinary manifestation of energy, the "Powers" that remain in "concert" in relation to Crete, are compelling the entire withdrawal of the Turkish troops from that island. The Turkish officials, by their usual twisting and delaying, have endeavored to avoid it, but this time the Powers seem in earnest.

-At

the Pennsylvania State Convention of the W. C. T. U., at Reading, on the 17th inst., Rebecca B. Chambers, of West Grove, was reëlected President. Resolutions that were adopted provide, among other things, for the petitioning of the Legislature to prohibit the custom of treating in saloons.

-The Spanish civil courts within the Philippine territory have resumed the exercise of their jurisdiction, subject to the supervision of the American Military Government, which reserves the exclusive right to exercise criminal jurisdiction.

-Pittsburg is to have a new Union railway station. It is to cost $1,645,000, and will be very like the Jersey City and Philadelphia stations of the Pennsylvania road, which is to build the structure. It was badly needed.

-Bishop Hartzell, of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Africa, who has been in Pittsburg, says he is commissioned to ask the protection of the United States for the negro republic of Liberia.

-The degree of Doctor of Laws has been conferred upon President McKinley by the University of Chicago.

-Edwin Clawston, the owner of an ostrich farm in South Pasadena, Cal., has succeeded in hatching ostrich eggs with an incubator. The process takes forty days.

** The Committee appointed by the New York Yearly Meeting Educational Committee in the interest of Swarthmore College will hold a meeting at Flushing, L. I., Tenth month 29, at 2.30 o'clock, p. m. All Friends interested in the College are invited to attend.

Albert A. MERRITT, Clerk.

10 a. m.

at 10 a. m.

IO a. m.

on First-day, Tenth month 30, 1898, at 2.30 p. m.

Subject: Temperance."

Our friend Joseph S. Walton expects to be in attendance.

An invitation is extended to all.

The 9.05 a. m. train on the Reading Railroad, also the 12.30 p. m., on the Penna. Railroad, Schuylkill Division, will be met at Phoenixville.

*** The Western First-day School Union will be held in the Friends' meeting-house, at Kennett Square, Pa., on Seventh-day, Tenth month 22, commencing at 10 o'clock a. m. All interested are invited to be present.

HORACE L. DILWORTH, Clerks.
ELLEN P. WAY,

** The 63d Annual Meeting of the Library Association of Friends will be held in the Lecture Room of Friends' Central School, 15th and - Race streets, on Sixth-day evening, Tenth month 21, 1898, at 8 o'clock.

At the conclusion of the regular business, including the appointment of officers and Committee of Management for the ensuing year. PROF. F. H. GREEN, of the West Chester State Normal School, will deliver his interesting lecture, “The Garden of English Literature.” A large attendance is desired, and all interested are invited.

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One lot of All-wool Cheviot Suitings, 50 inches wide. Special price, 58 cents a yard.

One lot of All-wool French Surah Serge, 50 inches wide. Special price, 68 cents. One lot of All-wool Crepon, effective designs, 42 inches wide. Special price,

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Handkerchiefs

A LITTLE girl wanted to know "if the Puritans were crazy," as she had read that they found an asylum in this country."

"

UNCLE HIRAM : They say that the sun never sets on the British Empire." Aunt Hannah : "Doesn't it, now? And we have such lovely sunsets over here!" -Puck.

A PARIS physician has lately nipped in the bud, so it is reported, a habit which might have become as dangerous as the use of morphine. A woman of fashion had tried perfuming herself by subcutaneous injections, and found that it was quite possible to give the body the fragrance of the lily or the rose. But her example was imitated with nearly fatal results, and the physician's warning has put a stop to the fad.

Tales of Slavery

are vividly pictured and recalled in the book entitled "A True Story of the Christiana Riot." It has had a remarkable sale, but every Friend should especially have a copy. Send your order now.

PRICE, $1.00, POSTPAID.

Address all orders to

MARVIN E. BUSHONG,

May P. O., Lancaster Co., Pa.

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The chapter, "Records of Richland Meeting," is well worth the cost of the book to descendants of Richland Friends.

Price $3. In pamphlet form, $2.50. On and after the first of the new year, the price will be advanced to $5 each on all copies remaining. Orders, with the money, should be sent to ELLWOOD ROBERTS, Norristown, Pa. N. B. A few copies of "Lyrics of Quakerism sale at $1.25 each.

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