inspired the trees and shrubs whose fruits or grains formed their chief subsistence. Thus the corn spirit was worshiped as Ceres or as Demeter; the wine spirit as Liber, Dionysus, or Bacchus. And primitive peoples, as Mr. Frazer has shown, considered that these tree or plant spirits were actually inherent in the herbs or shrubs they caused to grow and animated. Hence it was of great importance to them to worship and appease the plant-spirit. But primitive men think grossly of the soul itself as in some way material, tangible, and visible, a little copy or miniature of the frame it inhabits. But what has this to do with the worship of the mistletoe? Well, a moment's consideration will show that, that in all northern climates, the trees of the forest, every autumn, die, to all outer appearances, when they shed their leaves, and are resuscitated again in the spring when their lost souls return to them. In the familiar legend of Demeter and Persephone, we see how profoundly this yearly death and resurrection of vegetation impressed early thinkers, and how implicitly they accounted for it, by supposing that the soul of all death plants went down during winter, to the nether world, the common realm of departed spirits. Now with a general philosophy like this fermenting in his brains, let barbaric man go out into the wild woods in the winter to see a green twig of mistletoe on an otherwise bare and leafless tree, and what idea must he almost necessarily form to himself of this surpassing phenomenon? Why, the idea that the twig is the incarnate soul of the tree, the living and immortal part which guards its life for it through the seeming death or long sleep of winter. And there is evidence, in abundance, that he did actually so regard that strange evergreen parasite. Everywhere the mistletoe was held in mystic honor, and was worshiped as the very soul of the forest trees, to which men in the hunting and early agricultural stage owed so large a boon of food, and fire, and shelter. The life of the tree-the life of the wood, the grove, the forest-was thus intimately bound up, men thought in their quaint philosophy, with the life of the mistletoe. Tear it off and another sprang up new in its place, to be the embodiment and representative of all the trees around it. Uno avulso non deficit alter," says Virgil of the "golden bough" which Æneas plucks under the advice of the Sibyl, and anyone who looks at the yellowish-green leaves of our Christmas plant will never doubt that it is indeed the golden bough in question. Not only, however, is the mistletoe bound up with the life of the tree, it is closely bound up, too, with the soul of the special human being who also represents the soul of the woodland. Many mythological tales show us cases of sacred persons who can never be killed till a certain evergreen bough is plucked from a tree-a bough whieh contains their fate, their soul, their destiny, Thus Balder could be hurt only by a shaft of mistletoe; and thus, even in historical times, the awful priest of the grove of Aricia—"the priest who slew the slayer, and shall himself be slain"-could be attacked only after his assailant had plucked from the sacred grave, of which he was representative and guardian, a bough of mistletoe, the soul and embodiment of the whole forest. The assailant, if he conquered, became the new Rex Nemorensis, and forthwith a fresh mistletoe sprang up in sympathy. Now, how does all this tell you the Druidical custom and the present Christmas use of the mistletoe? Can any traceable connection be shown to exist between the King of the Wood and the custom of kissing pretty girls under the pale white berries? I fancy, yes; and it comes about in this way. There can be little doubt that to the ancient Celtic nations the oak and the acorn were objects of concern and, perhaps, of worship. They subsisted to some extent on acorns, having no cereals. To a people with such habits a mistletoe, when it grew on an oak, which was very rare, must have represented the mbodied soul of the oak-tree, the father and producer of all'acorns. Hence, it was naturally an object of very profound and peculiar worship-a visible god-the tree-spirit in its most important and economically useful avatar: no wonder it was cut, as we read, with a golden knife and reverently received into a fine linen cloth for the adoration of its woad-stained votaries. But why cut it at all? Possibly, as in the case of the Arician priesthood, it was done only as an accompaniment of those other bloody rites, which, as we know, formed part of the Druidical religion. If so, then possibly, when a mistletoe was cut, a human representative of the forest soul, an incarnate oak-spirit, a Celtic Rex Nemorensis, was sacrificed also; 'and, in order that the human embodiment of the divine soul might not grow old and feeble, so that all trees might suffer, he was killed, as Mr. Audrew Lang phrases it, "with all the pluck in him." So, too, the mistletoe itself was, perhaps, cut down in its prime, in order that it might be replaced by a vigorous successor. The mistletoe thus shown to owe its sanctity to the very oldest and bloodiest stratum of savage religious thought, owes its connection with Christianity to Gregory's famous advice to Augustine to Christianize the holy places of the heathen, so that the people might still worship at their aecustomed shrines. Last of all, but most important to the giddy minds of youth, why do we kiss unreproved under the mistletoe? It may be only a survival of the old saturnalian freedom of the season, but I hold that it has a deeper and more mystical significance. In many primitive tribes, the death of a chief is followed by a period of wild license which remains unchecked until a new chief restores order. Now, is it not probable that the midwinter orgy is similarly due to the cutting of the mistletoe? Perhaps even to the killing of the King of the Wood, along with it. Till the new mistletoe grows are not all things allowable? I cast this hint out as a possible explanation of saturnalian freedom in general, and kissing in particular. CAVE-DWELLERS IN EQUATORIAL AFRICA. M. LORTZING. SOME Vom Fels zum Meer, Stuttgart, December. OME seven years ago, Jos. Thompson aroused very general interest by an account of inhabited caves, which he had discovered in a mountain in Africa. On the northeast coast of the Victoria Nyanza he came to an old volcano, the Elgon, one of the greatest mountains of equatorial Africa, rising to a height of more than fourteen thousand feet above the plain. Both near the foot of the mountain and also high up its sides, Thompson discovered large caves, some of which extended to unknown depths into the mountain, and were occupied by hundreds of natives who built huts for themselves in the caves, and tended herds of cattle in them; and Thompson expressed the opinion that these caves had been artifically constructed. The savages had no traditions on the subject, but the investigator concluded that the excavations were the work of ancient miners. Circumstances rendered it impossible for him to enter into an exhaustive investigation of the mountain and its cavedwellings, but lately J. J. Jackson, of the British East-African Company, traveled from Uganda across the Elgon, and traversed the summit ol the old volcano from north to south. He has not yet returned to England, but a short account of his journey has been published in the proceedings of the Royal Geographical Society. His investigation of the mountain extended over eight weeks, and the ascent from the foot to the crater occupied six days. Books. THE FINANCIER AND THE FINANCES OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION. By William Graham Sumner, Professor of Political and Social Science in Yale University. In Two Volumes. 8vo, pp. 309, 330. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co. 1891. [The first impression one gets of this work is that it resembles the well-known chapter entitled "Snakes in Ireland," in a description of that country, the entire chapter being comprised in the words: "There are no snakes in Ireland." It would appear at first blush difficult to fill two octavo volumes with an account of the "Finances of the American Revolution," if, as Mr. Sumner intimates, the Revolution seems never to have had any finances. Moreover, if there were no finances, there was apparently no need of a financier. From another point of view, however, the whole administration of the Continental Congress was financial. Professor Sumner modestly says that, as to the financial history of the Revolution, he has only reduced into accessible form the material nearest at hand. He has, however, studied with care a great deal of matter heretofore unprinted relating to the career of the "Financier," Robert Morris, though the Professor was not allowed to use the very important diary kept by Morris during his service as Superintendent of Finance, the diary being now the property of a churlish owner. The whole work must have cost the author a great deal of labor. He has weighed his material in the light of his own profound acquaintance with Political Economy, and the volumes are a very valuable contribution, not only to the literature of the subject, but to the history of the struggle for Independence. The book is handsomely made, with a "List of Authorities," and an admirable Index.] WE E are amazed at the recklessness with which the colonists plunged into the contest for Independence, when we realize their defenseless condition. When we find they were obliged to collect muskets from house to house, in order to obtain weapons; when we are forced to believe that the whole stock of powder in the thirteen colonies at the time of the battle of Lexington must have been reckoned in hundred weight, and that, as far as military resistance was concerned, General Gage might have marched from Boston to Savannah, because there was not powder enough in the colonies to keep up a week's military resistance; when we see that they were forced to make houseto-house collections of clothes, stockings, and shoes for the army, on a plan less efficient than that by which cast-off clothing is nowadays collected for charitable objects; when we see the desperate straits to which they were reduced for the lack of salt, lead, and iron—it is hard to understand under what ideas or with what intention they took up arms in 1775. In form, the Americans made the war offensive, for it was they who undertook to drive Gage out of Boston. After the expedition to Concord, he would, without doubt, have remained quiet in Boston for an indefinite length of time, if he had been unmolested. If the colonists had intended to have recourse to arms, it seems as though they might easily have won a year for adequate preparations. The expedition into Canada was also offensive in character. It was an enormous drain on their resources at the time. Commerce was indispensably necessary to provide the colonies with the means of carrying on war. Commerce, however, the leaders of the rebellion did all in their power to prevent, imagining that such prevention would be a very efficient weapon against the mother country. How were the sinews of war to be provided? To this question the citizen of a modern, well-organized State would instantly answer, “In the first place by taxation." The Continental Congress, however, had no power to impose taxes directly, and if such power had existed, the people of the thirteen colonies would have as passionately refused to be taxed as we refuse to be robbed. The American colonies resisted taxation in a way which to the modern man seems childish and igno rant. So the Continental Congress undertook to raise money by methods which to us appear as childish as the opposition of the colonists to taxation. Congress began by the device, even then venerable, of printing bits of paper and calling them money. Paper money, in excess, is bad enough when it is based upon taxation; but when it is issued in unlimited quantities, without any such basis, it is an expedient which can justly be called silly. When it was discovered that in consequence of the issue of paper money prices were going up, resort was had to the sage plan of Price Conventions, demanding that it be made a crime to charge more than a certain fixed price for anything. As an aid to this, Congress tried to give forced circulation to the continental paper. Embargoes were laid, forbidding all trade with the enemy. A huge lottery, in which every holder of a ticket was to receive a prize, was created. Impressment of horses, wagons, oxen, and mules was adopted, a system which, from the ancient empires down to modern Russia, has been one of the most oppressive burdens and vexatious abuses under which people have suffered. Some supplies and loans were obtained from Europe through the intervention of the Commissioners there. By the middle of 1780, however, every expedient for raising money had failed and American affairs were tending rapidly towards a catastrophe. The people were utterly tired of the war. The financial system—if so it may be called—had collapsed, and nothing could be put in its place. The specific supply system was a failure. In this dilemma Congress turned to Robert Morris. The majority of the members of Congress had at last discovered that they had undertaken to manage a business about which they knew nothing. So, on February 20, 1781, Morris was elected Superintendent of Finance the only man in the history of the world who ever bore that title-without a dissenting vote, although Samuel Adams and Artemas Ward declined to vote. Samuel Adams's reason for declining, considering the crisis, showed a lack of statesmanlike capacity. The reason was a " jealousy of delegated powers." Robert Morris was born at Liverpool, England, January 31, 1734, new style, and, when fourteen years old, was brought by his father, also named Robert, to this country. The will of the father, who died when his son was in his seventeenth year, seems to indicate that the son was a bastard, for the latter is not called in the will a son of the testator, but alluded to as a youth living in Philadelphia, known there by the name of Robert Morris, Jr. Young Morris, on his arrival in this country, had been placed in the mercantile house of the Willings at Philadelphia, although the father resided in Maryland. With the property young Morris inherited as a start in life, his shrewdness and attention to business made him rich. When he was appointed Superintendent of Finance, he was reputed to be worth more than a million dollars, a large fortune at that time. Morris was a member of the Continental Congress from November 1775. In 1776 he set an example of statesmanship by which Samuel Adams might have profited. Like Jay, Duane, Rutledge, Laurens and others, Morris was slow to come to the determination of Independence. More than a fortnight after the Declaration was passed, he wrote a letter, in which he declared his opinion that the time was improper for what had been done and that the act would neither promote the interest nor redound to the honor of America. Nevertheless, when the Declaration came to be signed on August 2d-it having taken two months to engross it-Morris signed the paper without hesitation, like a true statesman, who, when he finds he cannot carry a measure which commends itself to his judgment, gracefully yields to the inevitable, and gives hearty support to the next best measure. The appointment of Superintendent of Finance, which Morris received in 1781, was not one which he desired, or which any man, who knew anything about the situation, could have desired. In accepting the office he made great sacrifices. When he took office in May, 1781, the members of the Board of War told him there was not money enough in the treasury to send an express rider to the army. It is doubtful if the waste, extravagance, and folly of the previous financial management-system there was none-can be paralleled in history. Moreover, impossible things were expected of him. It appears to have been thought that by some magical operation he would bring in money from some unknown source. On the other hand, there were some things in his favor. Just before he took office, there had been an utter collapse of the paper currency, and it had thus been absolutely removed from circulation. As soon as it was out of the way specie came in. Thus Morris was able to throw aside all the trammels in which the treasury operations had been entangled by the paper system. The war Morris had to provide for the present and for the future. was still going on-was, in fact, at its height. He, therefore, required the taxes laid in specie, which would give him a revenue, and that these taxes should be federal. This revenue would pay the interest on the debt. Then he wanted requisitions paid in by the States as a reliance for war expenditure. He proposed to introduce a system of retrenchment and economy. France, in 1781, granted great help, especially by the importation of a part of that help in specie. With this he founded a bank, from which he borrowed six times what he put into it, the chief use of the bank to him being to discount the notes which he took for bills of exchange. Then, in the autumn of 1781, Cornwallis surrendered, an event which made it safe to reduce the army. Through the measures of Morris American credit rose, and a loan in Holland became possible. At times, however, Morris, as Superintendent, was in desperate circumstances, from which he extricated himself by dint of great ingenuity and patience only. The most heterogenous tasks were laid on him. His functions as Financier included nearly everything which could come under the general head of business. Of course, he had his share of fault-finding. His detractors argued that he deserved no great credit for his management of the finances. Yet Morris may fairly be said to have made effectual, by his measures, the independence of the United States. George the Third was a stupid fellow, but inside his thick skull occasionally there were gleams of sense. We see now in the retrospect that the King was right when he said, in September, 1780, that the war was one of credit. If England had chosen to persevere in the war, the matter of credit would have been the most important element in her chances of success, aside from the natural difficulties of the enterprise. It is painful to know that a man who had conferred such benefits on his country was, when advanced in life, an inmate of a debtors' prison. Those who have written about Morris and his career have almost always contrasted the end of his life with his services to the United States, and have expressed or implied blame on the country for neglect or ingratitude. It has even been said that Morris impoverished himself by the sums he advanced out of his private estate. There is a story, often repeated, that Morris advanced $1,400,000 for the outfit of Washington's army for the Yorktown campaign. It is said that goods to that amount were bought, sometimes with his notes, and sometimes with his own money. Morris's own report to Congress on the state of the treasury after the surrender of Cornwallis, declares, that the total amount he had advanced in cash or became liable for, on account of the Yorktown campaign. was $12,000, and this sum was repaid him. A little reflection will show that there is no ground whatever for any imputation of neglect or ingratitude on the country. The bankruptcy and Imprisonment of Morris were due to vast private speculations of his own alone. His enterprises were undertaken entirely on his own judgment and responsibility. He engaged in the ones which immediately caused his ruin ten years after he left office. He had a large salary and good opportunities, which he used while in office. He never gave anything to the public, nor lost anything by the public service. He died indebted to the United States for nearly $100,000. It cannot be said that the United States was bound to guarantee him against his own speculations for the rest of his life. The one defect in the character of Morris was a lack of fortitude. He entered upon a new undertaking with fire and enthusiasm, but seemed to tire of it later. For want of fortitude he could not bear up and persist against the disappointments, delays, shiftlessness, and negligence which, in his time, were universal. He married the sister of Bishop White, the venerated First Presiding Bishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States. By that lady he had seven children, of whom three boys and two girls survived him. He died in Philadelphia May 8, 1806, and was buried behind Christ Church on Second street in that city, in a vault which an inscription declares to be "The family vault of William White and Robert Morris." Legal proceedings in regard to the property of Morris were still going on as late as the year 1871. His heirs, in the end, received but little from his estate, but he left to them an imperishable name. THE BISHOP HILL COLONY; a Religious Communistic Settlement in Henry County, Illinois. Michael A. Mikkelsen, A. M. Johns Hopkins University Studies. Tenth Series, I. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press. 1892. [The history of the Bishop Hill Colony is part of the early history of Illinois. The history of its founders before their emigration to this country belongs to the ecclesiastical history of Sweden. They were primarily a religious society-Jansonists-who held views repugnant to the Church of Sweden, and who, to the number of eleven hundred, emigrated to the new world in search of freedom to worship God after their own manner. Incidentally, the Swedish Colony was an experiment in practical communism. Apart from from this, it inaugurated that mighty tide of Swedish emigration which has aided so materially in building up Illinois, and the entire Northwest; but, even as a community in those early days, in which they constituted one-fourth of the population of Henry County, and Chicago was only an overgrown village, the Bishop Hill Colony built mills, erected factories, put large quantities of money into circulation, broke up thousands of acres of virgin soil, engaged in banking, and was connected with the earliest railway enterprise in the State. In the days of its greatest prosperity, it was the principal commercial and industrial centre between the cities of Peoria and Rock Island. It is now thirty years since the society was dissolved. It outgrew its creed, and encountered difficulties in its communal organization, many of which must be met again in any attempt to apply the theories of modern socialism to practical life.] THE HE central idea of Jansonism, in the final stage of its development, may be summed up as follows: When persecution ceased under Constantine the Great, and Christianity became the State religion, Christianity became extinct. Eric Janson was sent to restore it. He represented the second coming of Christ. Christ revealed Himself through him, and should continue to do so through the seed of his body. The second advent of Christ was to be more glorious than the first, the work to be accomplished by Eric Janson should far excel that accomplished by Jesus and His Apostles. Eric Janson was to separate the children of God from the world, and gather them into a theocratic community. In America he was to build up the New Jerusalem, whence the Gospel should go forth to all the world. The New Jerusalem should quickly extend its boundaries, until it should embrace all the nations of the earth. Then should the millennium be ushered in, and Eric Janson, or the heirs of his body, should, as the representatives of Christ, reign to the end of time. Many of the Jansonists were miners and factory hands, unable to defray the expenses of a long journey, and this fact prompted Janson to make community of goods a part of the social economy of the New Jerusalem, and so the wealthy sold their property, real and personal, and the proceeds went into the common fund, along with the widow's mite. The first party of Jansonists arrived at Victoria in July, 1846, and, a few days later, removed to Red Oak Grove, in Weller Township, where their leader had purchased an improved eighty-acre farm for $250. August 2, one hundred and sixty acres of land in same township were purchased for $1,100. On September 26, quarter section fourteen, of township fourteen, was purchased of the United States Government for $200. Work proceeded briskly, and before the snow fell four parties of emigrants had arrived, and four hundred wintered in the settlement. A place of worship had been among the earliest structures erected, and twelve young men were selected for the conversion; but the Yankees were busy. Olof After some early difficulties inseparable from the planting of a settlement in the wilderness, the society, although still struggling with poverty and debt, began to manifest signs of prosperity, when Janson was murdered by the Swedish adventurer, John Root, to whom he had given his cousin in marriage, and his son was promptly set aside in favor of Jonas Olson, the real founder of the religious revival in Sweden, and a man of much greater administrative ability. Under his management the society flourished rapidly, but as its wealth accumulated, it engaged in financial speculations which, in the financial crisis of 1857, terminated disastrously. The inevitable reaction against the management of the trustees set in, and the trustees, and especially the Chief, Olof Johnson, were accused of transcending their powers, and squandering the property of the community. Johnson was deposed from office, but he secured an injunction against the Colony, and had himself, with certain of his friends, appointed receivers to wind up the affairs of the corporation. An allotment of the communal property in severalty was decided on, and was carried into effect; but the trustees made no reports, and in 1865 Olof Johnson assessed the individualized lands at ten dollars an acre. In 1868 an additional assessment of eleven dollars an acre was made. Suit was then brought against the trustees by Bill in Chancery, and the special master found that the trustees were indebted to the colony in the sum of $109,619.29. The case lasted twelve years and impoverished many, and the settlement languished until after Olof Johnson's death, when it was ended by a compromise. The immediate cause of failure was, as we have seen, the disastrous financial management; but there were other contributory causes. Chief among these was religious tyranny and consequent dissension, and the gradual importation of ideas and habits antagonistic to the communal life. The majority of the early founders of the colony are now dead, but Jonas Olson still preaches occasionally in the Old Colony Church, and although his voice trembles and his frame shakes, the fire of the old-time eloquence is not wholly wanting. The majority of the Jansonists have joined the Methodist communion, and Bishop Hill Colony s truly a deserted village going to ruin. The Press. POLITICAL. THE ORGANIZATION OF THE HOUSE. -CONSIDERABLE PLAIN TALK.' the country or the Democratic party on Speaker Crisp. Indiana as 66 too aggressive" in their opposi- | finances could not have been placed in charge tion to McKinleyism, leaving on the Committee of the Democratic policy on the financial quesas strong tariff reformers only Messrs. Wilson tion; but in his appointment the Speaker has of West Virginia and McMillin of Tennessee, 'followed his own judgment" without reso handicapped that they can do nothing gard to the warnings which have been given against Reed, Burrows, and others, the most and despite the well-known fact that if the bitter radicals of the House, put on this Com- Democratic party shall adopt the policy of mittee to hold in check the little minority of free, unlimited, and independent coinage of aggressive tariff reformers who can expect no silver it will lose the Electoral vote of every effective support from Do-Nothing Democrats. Eastern and Middle State at the next PresiLouisville Courier-Journal (Dem.), Dec. 24. As for the rest of the committees, it is enough dential election, besides bringing the business -Mr. Springer has not, during his sixteen to say that they show a vendetta against the of the entire country to bankruptcy. With the years of service in Congress, shown the tariff reformers who supported Mills. The Crisp policy of tariff reform the Democratic peculiar capacity to lead the House. Ener- men who have made their names familiar to party will lose the Northwestern States; with getic, courageous, honest, he has been so, but the whole country in their fight for Democratic the Crisp policy of free silver it will lose New he has lacked, or has seemed to lack, the weight reforms are given only second and third places. York, Connecticut, New Jersey, Massachuwhich commands following. He has never First places are given to those who got up vote setts, Ohio, and other States which are necesbeen a member of the Ways and Means Comcorners and were 'long" on votes when the sary to the election of a Democratic Presimittee. It is not suspected that he has any Gorman triumvirate was 66 short " on them. dent. large and luminous view of the issue which has The deals then made are carried out, even to We cannot congratulate Speaker Crisp on his committees, and we cannot congratulate become the absorbing aim of his party. His selection smacks too much of the discharge of giving the World's Fair Committee Chairmanship to young Durborow of Chicago, a mere an obligation and a pretext to turn down and lad, who, young as he is, showed a capacity degrade a man who has done eminent and effi- for making his vote count for his own advancecient work in the great movement, and who ment at the start of his political career in a way has engaged the confidence of Democrats that promises great things for his future. So everywhere. We shall not believe until we much for men as they represent the know more than we know now that this con- issue. Beyond this, it remains to be said struction of the Ways and Means Committee that Mr. Crisp and Mr. Springer with him will has been made with the purpose to belittle and be judged on the issues. The Ways and subordinate the cause of tariff reform by intrust-Means Committee has Mr. Springer at the ing it to inexperienced and inferior hands. We head of the Democrats, and Mr. Tom Reed of have thus far relied upon the assurances of Mr. Maine at the head of the Republicans; with Crisp on that point. But if it should turn out Mills, the Breckinridges, and Bynum left out; that these have been carefully framed to mis- with Mr. Turner of Georgia, who in the past lead, and that the extraordinary disclosures of has given little more than his vote to help the the current week point, as has been so often intimated, to a deal of the regulation New aggressive tariff reformers, thrown in merely as a make-weight. The Committee has all the York pattern between the new Speaker and his immediate backers and Governor Hill and appearance of being packed to bring about a standstill. But there is no standstill in the his immediate backers, by which Democratic principles are to be sacrificed to a Congres- and Springer will either go forward with it, or It will go forward, and Messrs. Crisp sional and Presidential bargain, then, indeed, else they will go back with Gorman that he will the hosts of Democracy rise in their might and his reactionists may either form a party and in their wrath, scattering these impious of their own, or else go over to reinforce their despoilers of truth and faith like a herd of friends, the McKinley monopolies in the Recattle. The future alone can determine this. publican party. The issues are joined and they Much will depend on the course of the new will be fought out without flinching. DemoWays and Means Committee. But the present crats will fight forward, striking first at those is no time for mincing words. It is a time for who treacherously attempt to turn them back plain talk. The new Speaker's organization from the enemy. of the House is a revolution both theoretical and actual. It is an experiment whose success or failure is yet to be tested. It starts out with the clear and almost universal distrust of Democrats in every part of the Union. The overcoming of this, and the establishment of its claim to public confidence can only be achieved by the display of great earnestness, perfect fidelity, and undeniable competency. The brain and heart of the Democratic party, which still lead it, will submit to no equivocation. They cannot be made to surrender their convictions to temporizing politics, no matter how practical. Mr. Crisp should, from this time forward, keep ever before his eyes the awful spectre of Keifer, and if he has any hope of a prosperous or an honorable future, should steer clear of New York breakers. St. Louis Republic (Dem.), Dec. 24.-If he Republic needed any justification of its course in relation to the organization of the House, it would have it in the House committees as they are now announced by Mr. Crisp. It is safe to say that if a single one of these committees that of Ways and Means-had been announced by him six weeks ago as the Committee he would appoint if chosen Speaker, he would have been hissed out of the contest issue. Atlanta Journal (Dem.), Dec. 24.-This ar rangement does not satisfy the Democratic party, and the freedom with which the Demoeratic press is commenting on it is perfectly natural. Some of the Republican papers are already proclaiming that the Speaker's arrangement of the Ways and Means Committee indicates a weakening of the Democratie position on the tariff. The party never was so solid on this question as it is now, and it is solid on the line which President Cleveland aid down in his annual Message of 1888, and for which Mr. Mills contended o nobly as Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee. It is our opinion that the party needs Mr. Mills at the head of the Ways and Means Committee at this time. We have well-grounded fears that the gentleman who has been placed there is neither able to sustain in a satisfactory manner the leadership that has been conferred upon him, nor disposed to pursue a policy which will prove beneficial to the party's prospects. Another thing that we regret is that Speaker Crisp saw fit to remove Mr. Bynum, of Indiana, from the Ways and Means Committee. He had done splendid service there, and was fairly entitled to a high place in the new Committee. can imagine no good reason for throwing Mr. Bynum off and substituting for him a Mr. Shiveley of Indiana, of whom the country knows almost nothing except that he is one of the youngest men in Congress, and stands We Indianapolis Sentinel (Dem.), Dec. 25.Speaker Crisp nas made a very bad beginning -a very bad beginning indeed. There is no use in pretending otherwise, or in trying to deceive ourselves as to he facts. Mr. Watterson does not state the case too strongly when he says that the organization of the House is an experiment which clear and almost the universal distrust of It Democrats in every part of the Union." must be admitted that at the present moment the outlook or the Democratic party is any. thing but hopeful. Heaven grant that the clouds may roll by in the near future. Nashville American (Dem.), Dec. 24.-"It "starts out with the Baltimore Sun (Dem.), Dec. 24.-That the Speaker has been actuated by any petty personal feeling or motive in the matter is inconceivable. It is necessary, therefore, to look beyond the Speaker for an explanation of his action. It unfortunately gives color to the suspicion already widely entertained and freely expressed from one end of the country to the by the Democratic party. The Republic was Charleston News and Courier (Dem.), Dec. other that the House of Representatives has not fully believed by all Democrats then when 24.-The composition of the [Ways and fallen under the influence of a Senatorial junta it pointed out that it was an issue for the Means] Committee shows how abject has been or cabal; that its choice of a Speaker has not reform of the tariff as against the McKinley the surrender of Speaker Crisp to the reaction- been free from outside and disturbing influBill, supported by Gorman, Brice, and other ary elements in the party. We dare say that ences, that should not have been recognized or allies of the Plutocracy who are kept in the a more cowardly abandonment of a great prin- permitted to intrude, and that these influences Democratic party as mischief-makers. It ciple has never been known in the history of have been more intent upon shaping the policy would have had even less credit then had it any political party. We are to have "the of the party and controlling its choice of Presipointed out the details of what it saw to be the twin issues" of the Atlanta Constitution-a dential candidates in 1892 than upon promotgeneral outline of the situation-had it said milk-and-water policy on the tariff and un- ing ts present harmony, without which the that in the event of Gorman's success his man limited free silver. Bland, of Missouri, has success of any platform or ticket in 1892 would put off the Ways and Means Com- his reward. He is Chairman of Speaker may be wholly problematical. The Sun mittee Mills, Breckinridge of Arkansas, Crisp's Committee on Coinage, Weights, and has no disposition to antagonize or critiBreckinridge of Kentucky, and Bynum of Measures. A more dangerous lunatic oncise the Speaker. It is most anxious to " see the Democratic party in the House united, strong, and harmonious in the support of true Democratic principles and measures. But to the want of tact displayed in his letter to Mr. Mills tendering him the "second place" on the Committee on Ways and Means Mr. Crisp, it seems, has added a further blunder in needlessly emphasizing, by his action, what was supposed to be the "true inwardness' and significance of his own nomination and of Mr. Mills's defeat. It may be a temporary triumph for the Senatorial politicians and managers who are credited with having caught the Democratic House in their toils and added another leaf to their reputation for " superior generalship," skillful management, and adroitness, but the effect upon the country at large and upon the honest masses of the party is another and very different question. Philadelphia Record (Ind.-Dem.), Dec. 24.After ten years of straight sailing, with the harbor in sight, some of the managers of the Democratic party appear to have lost their bearings. They are apparently determined to alter the course of the political craft of which they are in temporary charge, and to steer it straight upon the shoals of free coinage. Should this course be persisted in, the attempt to win the Presidency in 1892 might as well be abandoned. The new direction given to party movement seems to be dictated by personal rather than patriotic considerations. The object in view manifestly is the defeat of the nomination of Grover Cleveland for the Presidency. The Committee on Ways and Means and the Committee on Coinage have some strong men on them, whose influence may be relied upon to be exerted in the right direction; but the one appears to have been arranged on the see-saw principle, so balanced as to be ineffective for any good purpose; and the other to effect a distinctly dangerous purpose. New York Herald (Ind.-Dem.), Dec. 24.The Committees, as a whole, are fairly well made up. The Speaker has disregarded precedent in making the assignments, and the House in its organization reflects his own ideas. The Ways and Means Committee will report no general tariff bill. The Appropriations Committee, with Holman at its head, will exercise great economy. While the Coinage Committee is composed largely of free silver men, it is not at all certain that it will report a free silver bill. Many Democrats predict the loss of every Eastern State next fall if the Democratic House passes a free coinage bill. Such a bill would never receive the President's signature if it passed the Senate. The sensible free coinage men see the futility and the danger of trying to push their bill through. The chances are, therefore, that the attempt, if made, will fail. The Naval Committee is a strong one and favorable to the best interests of that departOf course there is some personal soreness over the committee assignments, but it will wear off when work begins. All talk of a split in the party is nonsense. ment. New York Sun (Dem.), Dec. 26.—There has been a good deal of unnecessary worrying and weeping about the Chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee. So far as legislation in the present Congress is concerned, the Appropriations Committee is the leading committee, and that is in good hands. The country wants the appropriations cut down, and expects to have them cut down. Trying to cut down the tariff is merely wasting time under the existing conditions. As for the Chairmanship of the Ways and Means Committee in so far as that place involves the so-called leadership of the House, Mr. Springer has experience enough and ability enough to disappoint his enemies and surpass the expectations of his friends. The leadership, however, will go to the most resourceful, practiced, quick-witted, and self-possessed man on the Democratic side. The precedence given by the chairmanship of an important committee can be retained only by intellectual qualities. Mr. Mills has sufficient opportunity for distinction, and nobody will grudge it to him. Mr. Springer Mr. Bland He may has in memory the doleful failure of the Hon. | has indicated in recent utterances. Philadelphia Times (Ind.-Dem.), Dec. 24.— Mr. Crisp has evidently gone about his task with caution, and so far as his assignments can be judged they will command general confidence. The Committee on Ways and Means is a particularly strong one, and s a committee that not only will take no step backward, but may be expected to take some decided steps forward in tariff reform. While Mr. Mills is not on this Committee, the sentiment that sustained him as a tariff reformer is apparently preponderant, with an added infusion of practical good sense that is likely to be productive of results. The Committee on Coinage is for free silver. That is plain. Whatever the personal convictions of the Speaker, he could not fail to recognize that the silver issue must be frankly met, and he has formed this Committee in accordance with what is apparently the sentiment of the House, so that the issue may be brought promptly and fairly before it. Chicago Herald (Dem.), Dec. 25.-Speaker both politician and statesman Crisp was enough to understand that the Chairman of Ways and Means and the leader on the floor must be a Northern Democrat. Turning then to the Northern members of the House, to whom should he look? What Northern Democratic member is to be compared with Mr. Springer either in personal qualifications, experience, or soundness of judgment with respect to party policy? Upon geographical considerations what other man could have been chosen? Here in the West is the battleground of commercial liberty, and from the West either the party leader in the chair or the party leader on the floor should come, if the right man could be found in the West. Houston (Tex.) Post (Dem.), Dec. 25.Aside from the matter of personal preference, there will be wide differences of opinion as to the wisdom and party policy ot the Speaker's Harrisburg Patriot (Dem.), Dec. 24.-The selection. Some of he objections may be well construction of the Ways and Means Committee taken. It would be strange, indeed, if he had conclusively proves that Mr. Crisp meant what so formed his committees as to please everyhe said when he declared he would take no one and leave no good ground for complaint. backward step in tariff reform. With Springer, It may be, however, that he has builded wiser McMillin, Wilson, and Stevens, four of the than we know, and that the appointments are most advanced tariff reformers in the House, not so unwise as some are now disposed to beon that committee, there can be no lieve. retroAt any rate the Speaker should be given gression. That the principles of the party a fair chance, and it may be that things will will not suffer at the hands of the new Speaker turn out much better than now seems probhe has already demonstrated, and that the new able. We must hold up the hands of the Democratic Congress will pave the way for a party if we expect to win the great battle of Presidential victory in 1892 its deliberations 1892. will soon attest. MUGWUMP VIEWS. The Committee on Ways and Means announced publican standpoint they are all Free Traders. can Detroit Free Press (Dem.), Dec. 24.-On the whole Mr. Crisp has made what any fair critic will say is an excellent committee list, though, as was perhaps to be expected, he has leaned toward the members to whom he was indebted for his nomination in the caucus. As has been well understood would be the case, Mr. Springer goes to the head of the Ways and Means Committee, and in that position he will have an opportunity to attack the tariff monstrosity on the thoroughly practical lines he has suggested. The Free Press believes Mr. Mills would have done the same thing, and that by virtue of his great knowledge of the subject, his high standing, and his long service from Texas should have been given the posion the Committee, the distinguished member tion he occupied in the 50th Congress. But Mr. Springer is an ardent tariff reformer and a Harter of Ohio on the Committee, because they have qualified themselves most skillful parliamentarian. He is a strong man, and his Democratic associates on the Commit- distinctly to serve on it. All that we tee are strong men. the Committee at present is The appointment of Mr. say about Springer, and the composition of the Commit- that its tone is conservative. It will not do anything rash. The question is whether it tee, will deprive the Republicans of the stereotyped and unfair cry that the South dominates will do enough to satisfy the demands of the tariff reform sentiment of the country which of the Democratic membership is from North- is identified with the policy of attacking the the Ways and Means Committee. A majority elected the present Congress. Mr. Springer present tariff by piecemeal instead of striking it as a whole. In this we think that he is right. At the same time we doubt whether he can lead the attack as well as Mr. Mills might have done. It is satisfactory to see that he will have the assistance of Mr. Wilson of West Virginia, than whom there is not a more solid debater or one better equipped on either side of the Chamber. While we regret very much that Mr. Mills was not placed at the head of the Committee, we recognize the fact that a party issue cannot be made out of the committee assignment of any individual. ern States. Chicago Times (Dem.), Dec. 25.-Speaker Crisp has proceeded in accordance with the instructions of the Democratic majority as he understood them. He has placed Mr. Springer at the head of the Ways and Means Committee, and in so doing has strictly followed the implied instructions of his party friends. The country will examine the committees with no fear that ruin impends because the ambitions of one or a dozen statesmen have been curbed. There never was a time when the Democratic party was so impoverished as to have but one leader. Its majority will not now believe that victory has been surrendered because a chairman of an important committee has been chosen from Illinois rather than from Texas. Mr. Bland at the head of the Committee of Coinage, Weights, and Measures will have the support of the party if he follow the course he Dec. 24.-Probably a majority of the Democratic members of the present House are in favor of the free coinage of silver. Therefore Mr. Bland's appointment as Chairman of the Coinage Committee was entirely fitting. It was fitting also that a majority of the Committee should agree with the Chairman. All that |