toughness unrelieved by any disguise or compromise whatever. It may not be quite proper to say that Tammany owes its power solely to its "toughness." Of course, as far as the organization itself, is concerned, it is strictly true. But it is able to control New York city simply because of the apathy of the good people of that city, and their lack of organization and concentration against this scourge of civilization. For, of course, no thinking man or woman doubts for a moment that there are enough good people in that great city, that is, enough who are opposed to Tammany, to sweep that organization of crime out of power and keep it out. To argue otherwise would be to say that New York had gone to the devil hopelessly and absolutely. Sometimes this tougn element, or part of it, from both parties runs off on some insane idea, organizes a party, nominates a national ticket, makes a little show at election and immediately settles down into oblivion again, which is its only proper place. Of this the late Debs party is an example. Now it is barely. possible that some man who is neither a tough nor a fool voted for Debs for President, but if so he is one who depends on some one else to do his thinking, and the reason a man does that is because he has not the capacity to do anything of that kind himself. Of course there was nothing alarming in the Debs movement because it was too insignificant to be alarming, but it shows how utterly incapable some men are of making any intelligent use of the ballot. There is another way in which the tough element creeps into politics, and that is in the appointing power. Not that men who are generally elected to important offices are anxious to appoint * toughs to fill the places they control, but they are often almost forced by circumstances to do so. After election a party leader-not a very worthy man, perhaps, but a party leader-comes to the successful candidate and says "Now here is Mr. Beermonger. He worked hard for the party besides contributing ten dollars to the campaign fund and we must give him a good job." The newly elected may be already looking toward re-election or he may aspire to a higher office and he must please the party "leader" and must also respect the "influence" of Mr. Beermonger, who keeps a saloon in a "tough" locality and who not only contributed ten of his precious dollars, but delivered the votes of Rednosed Pete, Rickety Jim and several other well-known "politicians" who have been honored with aliases and who also "work" in a campaign. * So. Mr. Beermonger is given the office of license collector which he fills without any honor to himself or anyone else and also without neglecting his saloon business. This element is as much of a curse to a party as it is to a community, but it is not clear that there is any way to get rid of it under present conditions, nor is it at all evident that any party is straining itself to find a way. But is certain that the party that can absolutely and finally shake off the tough element will soon be the party. It will suffer defeat once, perhaps twice. But as soon as it is known that the incubus has really been shaken off, the respectable people of all parties will rally to its support and will carry it to a victory which shall be final and decisive. Where is the party with the courage to begin a crusade against this element whose only tendency is toward degradation and destruction? * Charles K. Burnside. 'Tis not in battles that from youth we train "To no one mind is it given to discern the Is it because truth is many-sided? Is it because the finite mind cannot grasp the Infinite? Whatever the reason for this mortal limitation may be, there is no denying that James is right. And yet each mind can discern enough of the truth, if so willed, to insure the soul's salvation. "I am the truth," saith the Christ, but by what devious paths do we follow him. No man treads in another's steps, no man sees with another's eyes, or hears with another's ears, yet each glimpses some ray of truth, be it ever so faint, or so brightly beaming. And if he strives to walk by the light of that ray he will find the pathway widening as he progresses, and growing in beauty and brightness as the days go by. The world is hungry for the truth. The cry goes up continually and with ever increasing earnestness, for light, more light. For men are blind from the beginning, and deaf. They stand fronting their own shadows, and, beholding only the darkness thereof, deny the glory of the "Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world" if he will but turn from the continuous contemplation of error and recognize the truth for which in reality his soul thirsts and hungers. If he will listen, not to the commotion of sound that results from the clash of material things, but to that "still voice" that is best heard when the ear is sealed to earth-born voices, he will grow in comprehension of the deeper meaning of life, and its mysteries will become a luminous harmony to him. In this enlightened age no man looks for truth at the bottom of the well. Neither is it necessary to scale the barren wind-swept heights away from the world of human lore and brotherhood, toiling upward with bruised feet and bleeding palms to die grasping a single white feather from the wing of truth, isolated from all that makes life dear and death worth while. It is coming to be commonly recogninzed that Christ is close at hand-that truth is here, within touch. That man has but to be quickened spiritually to discern its presence. "God has always beenrevealing himself increasingly to man. The very progress of all knowledge depends on the degree in which man is able to recognize and receive his revelation," writes one who has grasped the "Spiritual significance" of life here and hereafter. The Christ ideal grows upon the vision of the human soul. The truth that was put in words nearly two thousand years ago thrills through the world's heart today as never before, and men read the gospel and find it vivid and glowing. It is no longer an abstract theory but an actuality-a moving force, a beautiful living verity, "That light that lighteth every man. that cometh into the world." The Home Maker. Oraarv. Woman's mental, as surely as her physical qualities call her to the home life as her special and peculiar work, says the author of "True Womanhood." It is not that she can do nothing else, but that she can do this as no other can. If she does not make home, home cannot be made. The world needs her there. Her on heart calls her to do it. Man's heart and life need just the influence. The Age of the Boarding House. This is the age of the boarding house and the hotel. Home life in the old tim acceptance of the term is rapidly ceasing to be. The family fireside is become but a shadowy sentiment. There is neither time nor inclination, apparently, to hold to the old-fashioned idea of domestic comfort. Men find in the well-appointed club a freedom from responsibility which a highly cultivated modern selfishness demands, and regards as a legitimate reward for daily exertion. The modern woman, too, whose chief aim seems, to an interested outsider, to be to ape man and rob him of all his long-cherished prerogatives, is beginning to build clubhouses after the most approved masculine plan. The fashionable club, the boarding house and the family hotel have so far superseded the home that we as a people are in danger of forgetting much that endeared that word. to our parents and grandparents. If James Howard Payne were living today it is a question whether or not he would have had sufficient sentiment to write "Home, Sweet Home." For sentiment of this nature seems already waning. "The charm from the skies" has all but vanished, and the homely hearthstone that was to our ancestors an alter upon which burned with a steady radiance the fires of family affection and domestic content is no longer hallowed as of old. Home life entails responsibility. This is the secret of the growing popularity of the boarding house, the hotel and the club. For responsibility, practical responsibility is regarded by the modern. wife and mother generally as a disagreeable and unkind imposition of fate that one is free to ignore, or to get rid of, as the case may be. Theoretically, of course, she is quite willing to take it up and discuss it from every point of view, and at length in her clubs, societies and multiplied organizations, and to write exhaustive papers about it for publication in the daily press and the magazines, salving her conscience, if she has any, with words, which are so much eaiser than deeds. When it comes to actual effort, to the real bearing of domestic burdens, the discharge of household duties she is mutely inactive. And in this course she bravely imitated by her husband and brother. If the modern woman is selfish, the modern man is not less so, for in the providing and keeping of the home he must do his part. That he prefers not to do it, is evidenced undeniably. He is too busy making money and spending it to care very greatly about such antiquated notions as domestic happiness and home comfort. The pursuit, capture and redistribution of the almighty and elusive dollar is at once so exciting and absorbing that he is left neither time nor inclination to cumber himself with family cares. Consequently he either evades matrimony altogether or else shelters his wife and possible children in a hotel or a boarding house. There are people, it is true, yet left upon the face of the earth who are so far behind the age that they have not succumbed to the boarding house habit, who still prefer to be burdened with the responsibilities of a house and family. And there are a few who even go to the length of asserting that these responsibilities are sweet and much to be desired, charming young mothers who eschew woman's clubs and claim to find the ordering of a home and the rearing of children occupations as delightful as they are exacting, husbands and fathers to whom the outer world affords no attractions strong enough to annul the influence of the domestic hearth. these, few though they be and decreasing in number year by year, are the salt of the earth. In them lies the hope of the race the redemption of mankind from its overweening selfishness. George Melvin. And Minnie Maddern Fiske can have nothing to complain of so far as this particular part of the Pacific coast is concerned. Portland gave her an enthusiastic welcome, and eager audiences packed the Marquam every performance. "As Becky Sharp she was perfectly irresistible," said the pretty matinee girl whose opinion is not to be despised. "If I had been a man I should certainly have gone down on my knees to her." "I never realized," remarked the pretty girl's brother, "how disagreeable Thackery's heroine was until I saw Becky on the stage. She had not one redeeming feature.' That the people of Portland appreciate to the full the best productions of the day is evidenced by the manner in which they received Mrs. Fiske and her excellent company. George Bernard Shaw, the playwright, is several other things besides the writer of alleged dramas. Political reformer, novelist, musical, art, and dramatic critic he is all these, but above all, and in addition thereto, he is a born debater. He is declared by those who know him best to be as nearly devoid of sentiment as a man may be. It is neither enthusiasm nor oratory that gives him power as a speaker, but simply his clear intellect. "His words are cold as steel and they cut." Concerning his dramas, the critics agree that this same Bernard Shaw who rails at Shakspeare because "his ideas are so ordinary and his philosophy so obvious," writes very good dialogues but plays-never! * Sousa's return was one of the events in local musical life. He was preceded by Lenora Jackson, the charming violinist. who came under the auspices of the musical club. Speaking of the musical club reminds me of a Portland musical organization that is deserving of almost unbounded praise at the hands of the public. I refer to the Symphony Orchestra. It is doing much to raise the musical standard of this city, and great credit is due to Mr. Charles L. Brown, its efficient director, for his untiring efforts in that direction. The last concert was the best attended of the season, and the orchestra itself plays in a manner that would be a credit to a very much larger city. Any mention of the Symphony Orchestra recalls to my mind the fact that this organization would be impossible but for the patronage of some of our wealthy citizens, and especially to Mr. W. D. Wheelwright, to whom the musicians of this city and the music-loving public as well owe a great debt of gratitude. Happiness. Ada Rehan has scored her greatest success, if the popular taste is to be credited, in "Sweet Nell of Old Drury." Oft she is a phantom shimmering And oft she comes in substance real -Andrew Franzen The" Nugget" Series. Five volumes, uniform size and style 35% x 5%; green flexible cloth, gilt top 45 cents per volume. Ford, Howard & Hurlburt, 47 East Tenth St., New York. The five volumes composing this series are "Don't Worry Nuggets," with portrait of Emerson and selections from Epictetus, Emerson, George Eliot, and Robert Browning, gathered by Jeanne G. Pennington; "Patriotic Nuggets, with portrait of Washington and selections from Franklin, Washington, Jefferson, Webster, Lincoln, and Beecher, gathered by John R. Howard; "Educational Nuggets," with portrait of Plato, and selections from Plato, Aristotle, Rousseau, Herbart, Harris, Butler and Eliot, gathered by John R. Howard; "Philosophic Nuggets," with portrait of Carlyle, and selections from Carlyle, Ruskin, Charles Kingsley, and Amiel, gathered by Jeanne G. Pennington, and "Historical Nuggets," with portrait of Macaulay, and selections from Macaulay, Stanley, Fronde, Fiske, Armstrong, and Emerson, gathered by John R. Howard. The volumes are of a convenient size and show evidence of very careful compilation. as a rule the selections are not to be found in larger and more pretentious books of the same character. They are, in reality, "nuggets," and wil be appreciated by all who have occasion to refer to such books. They are especially valuable to the teacher and writer, as they are full of selections that are rich in suggestion. One of the striking characteristics of these little books is that they are up to date, both as regards the authors from whom the selections are taken, and the nature of the selections themselves. These facts are impressed upon the reader at first glance. American writers, it will be n iced, are given the prominence which is 1stly due them. The problem of taking vows of celibacy by the clergy is decorously and gracefully brought forward in this entertaining romance. The author carefully avoids expressing his opinions and leaves the reader to form his own conclusions. This may be the most prudent course, where the arguments on both sides seem unanswerable. The story has to do with a spiritually minded young rector, St. Clair Madison, who has made vows of celibacy. His has been a peaceful and satisfactory life devoted to parish work, until he meets his counsel and spiritual consolation. He a beautiful young woman who has sought recognizes in her his ideal of womanhood, the whole current of his life is changed, and the conflict of the ascetic and the man in him is the motive of the romance. As a contrast to the rector, Cheever Gray, his old friend and college chum, stands out as the worldly-minded young man without a purpose, naturally good, but decidedly human. He is exceedingly lifelike, and gives a cheerful tone to the narrative. The village gossip is well drawn, as are several others who figure in the novel. In fact, characterization is the strong feature of the book. The plot is well worked out. The scenes are dramatic, but not overdrawn, and with the exception of a tendency to descend to trivialities and slang, the author has done very creditable work. |