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Grant County Herald A. L. SHERMAN, Editor and Publisher. Entered as second-class mail matter, at the postoffice at Lancaster, Wisconsin, under the Act of Congress. Pub lished every Wednesday morning, at Lancaster, Wiscon sin. ’ _____ Subscription (per year) $1.50 Wide columns make easy reading and big type save the eyes. The question is how to fill em. You see the columns being 50 per cent wider re quire just half again the effort and brains. Want ed: A few ideas! ooo Abe Lincoln has been dead for almost fifty-one vears, yet to-day his memory is brighter than ever before. After all, it matters little how men die or when they die. It matters a great deal how they have lived! ooo Eighty-two cadets kicked out of the Annapolis academy for failing to even land 62% per cent on their exams, indicate that our future naval offi cers are not taking preparedness very seriously. They might, however, make the best officers at that. ooo A crazy anarchist tried to murder a large body of innocent men the other evening in Chicago by putting arsenic in their soup. The trouble with these anarchists is that they do such stupid and futile things. What possible good could it have done anyone had these hundred men been killed ? ooo Abe Lincoln didn't loaf around the pool halls, shoot craps, drink booze, play the dude or cut-up, but kept right on sawing wood and doing things to improve himself and his opportunities. The world always needs big men, but the trouble with the average boy is that he would rather be small fry. ooo One of the sure signs, one almost might say harbingers of spring, is the budding forth of the candidate. Already one man is speaking for the office of county treasurer. Henry Roethe just aches to be senator, and several other aspirants infer that they may feel the call. Go to it boys, and good luck to all of you! ooo In this issue is published an article on the in creased cost of gasoline. Mr. Welch, the w r riter, should know whereof he speaks, for he has been in the oil game for many years. This matter of oil regulation hasn’t been settled yet by a long ways, and may not be until w r e get at trust legu lation in a sensible manner. Yes, the people can regulate even the most gigantic industries, but, as ever, “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.” ooo Some papers argue that the day of the country weekly is passing and that the city papers can better supply the rural communities w r ith news. With new r s of a certain class, of course they can. On the other hand nothing can take the place of the home paper and the desire of the public for home news cannot be filled by any outside organ. The country paper is more eagerly looked for ward to by its constituency to-day than ever. And the very good reason is that we very naturally take more interest in our own affairs than in any thing else. ooo Governor Philipp has appointed a Wausau man named Rosenberry to succeed Judge Barnes on the Supreme bench. The esteemed State Journal immediately raises the cry of “corporation law yer.” Well, some lawyers aren’t smart enough to be employed for corporation work and it holds by no means that a man is not going to be fair with the people regardless of whom he may have worked for in the past. It may also be said that about the silliest game imaginable is the old dem agogic cry of “wolf” every time a corporation is mentioned. There are good corporations and bad corporations; good men and bad men; good news papers and —the other kind. But it’s easy and used to be popular, to denounce corporations just as though we hadn’t created them ourselves and 1 hat they were not composed of human beings just like ourselves. ooo That small farm idea seems to have almost \ -a forgotten about in the last several years. At one time all you could hear was ten-acre tracts, ) lanting orchards and making your living out of t ruck between the rows while the trees were ma turing, and so on. Most of our farms are alto g* {her too big. It seems to be the consensus of that a farmer can do pretty w r ell on eighty acres, fairly so on forty, and would starve to death on ten. What we need in Grant county i> smaller farms and more population. The way ' this is by going in for more dairying. We iv.\e certain natural resources that make old ( !*:•: county lead the world almost in this line a 0.l v Idle dairy farming is immeasurably hard er h* n raising corn and hogs, the returns are r.uif h higher and more certain. The dairy farm ers whistled and kept drawing their cream cheek I his year while the corn was being frost ed and hogs were getting thinner all the time. Natural blue grass, abundant spring water, good dairy cow s, and pure bred hogs are a fine combin ation. We have the first two—we need more of the latter. GRANT COUNTY HERALD, LANCASTER, WISCONSIN, WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1916. New* York’s “400” is said to have gone crazy over a new’ dance called the “shadow’” dance. The good Lord lets some funny things live. ooo One thing that can be said for President Wil son is that he gets the same amount of abuse from both British and German sympathizers. When a man gets h 1 from both sides it be gins to look like he is absolutely neutral. ooo The celebrated and terrible European war be gan overnight almost, and with lightning speed the nations became involved and were killing each other. Some day it will end in the same manner. One day fighting and the next day—Peace. ooo Again we sing the praises of the moving pic ture machine. Travel subjects, drama, comedy, art, the world’s events and in fact all that the largest city can give, is to-day possible for the most retired small town or hamlet. The only re quirement being that electricity is available. The movies will go a long way toward helping save the world. ooo That awful Highland Park case, occupying the headlines, is the counterpart of thousands of oth er cases everywhere that just stop short of such terrible consequences, or are kept dark. All come from the stimulation our young people live under and their ignorance of the forces of life and now they slay if not understood and controlled. Poor boy, and poor girl! That city of Necedah which was gutted throughout the business district by a bad fire a month or so ago, has “come back” with surprising rapidity. Instead of having the unsafe and un sightly wooden buildings as before the fire, the merchants will build fine brick and tile struct ures, that w’hen completed w’ill be an ornament to the town. Fires are bad things but they some times are the making of a town. ooo Some of the most sickening drool we ever read is the series of articles called “Confessions of a wife,” being published in some of the dailies. This “stuff” has been running for the past sev eral years and there seems to be no end to the awful soul sufferings of Dick, the husband, and the woman, named Elsie. What they need is a few children, or if that is impossible wdth such emasculated types, a well applied paddle. ooo A man w’ho knows said recently that the Ger man and Scandinavian peoples become part of the soil and country quicker than any other race. Begin to own homes, thrive and prosper and be come American citizens in the true sense of the word. The reason is economic—the Germans and the Scandinavians go to the farms where the Lat ins and the Slavs go to the city and factories. The soil tillers thrive because their wealth increases even while they sleep. Owning land, owning a home, makes a man a citizen because he is natur ally interested in the country where he has his all. Worry about the patriotism of these people is foolish and futile. ooo THE LIMIT. (Fro'm the Minneapolis Tribune.) “No man will arm himself unless he means to attack,” says Mr. Ford. Tell that to the express messengers and the postoffice guards and the bank tellers in the smaller towns —and the horse marines. This is the clincher of Mr. Ford’s argument that “preparedness means war.” It comes from a man who admits that he has given so lit tle consideration to public affairs, till he caught his peace at-any-price fever, that, though old enough to vote for thirty-one years, he has never voted but six times, and then only “when my wife made me.” This is the man who presumes to declare to the world the sentiment of the American people on the subject of national defense. He may be granted all the good intentions that his friends claim for him —but that’s the limit. ooo CASEY ON PREPAREDNESS. (Knoxville, lowa, Express.) Preparedness is not a matter of principle but of degree. We are all in favor of preparedness. Even Mr. Bryan wants a nightwatch or two in town. Some w’ant more. No two men would have the same idea as to the exact number of soldiers and ships we should have. From Mr. Bryan we advance (or retrograde?) by insensible degrees to the kaiser —“from William of Lincoln to Wil liam of Germany,” as Senator Cummins puts it. Nobody wants to make America an armed camp, yet is it safe to leave all the doors unlocked and nobody awake? America is going to reason on these things. From the president, congress and people will finally come a program of defense that will be the consensus of American opinion, a com posite judgment of the American people, and in this we must place our trust. The president in his tours from city to city urging the necessity of national defense, Colonel Roosevelt breathing threatenings and slaughter and defying the world, Mr. Bryan preaching the gospel of altru ism ansl non-resistance, every man who writes or speaks on the subject-all these are contributing to the final judgment of the American people up on this question. Congress is the great melting pot of these divergent ideas, and each who likes may contribute and does contribute his bit of precious or base metal to the composite result. A PROSPECT OF PEACE Whether or not the gifted corres pondents who are cabling peace re ports from various parts of the com pass have any information to go upon, the time is the most propituous one for peace negotiations which has oc curred since the outbreak of the war. Before the battle of the Marne Ger many would not have considered it. Immediately after that battle the al lies’ terms would have been impossible of acceptance. Indeed, until last May the apparent collapse of Austria seemed to presage a Teuton catas trophe. Then came the tremendous Austro- German offensive which made the peo ples of those countries think that a military victory was about to crown their arms, while the allies still had hopes of victory in Gallipoli or on the western front. At the present moment matters ap pear to have reached a deadlock. The German general staff must have despaired of taking Calias or Dover, otherwise it would have tried to do so. It also seems to have found it im possible or not worth the risk to cap ture Petrograd or Moscow or even Kiev in Russia. It is a question whether the Ger man offensive had not reached its lim its even before troops were withdrawn for the drive into Serbia. The drive in Serbia has been suc cessful to the extent of opening com munications with Constantinople and of strengthening the pro-German party in Greece and Roumania, at least to the extent of keeping those countries from joining the allies. It has saved Turkey. It has not helped Germany. On the other hand, the allies’ great offensive on the western front has been developed and has failed. It is as nearly certain as anything can be in war that the German war machine is too well organized, too strong in material, numbers, and mor ale to be beaten down at any point by any armies the allies can bring against them. It also appears that the German ma chine can gain ground in any direction it may drive, but not that it can gain enough ground to bring a military vic tory. On the sea the British navy has completed its supremacy. Not only has it suppressed most of the German submarine activities but it has invaded Others can bring you up carefully; can give you equipment and education, but at the end there is but one power that decrees for or against your suc cess, and that is yourself. Stevenson said, “One man I had to make good. Myself. All others I have to make happy,—if I can.” Yourself is your direct point of con tact with the world and those about you. Yourself is the point that needs study and adjustment because the world by all the laws of physics and metaphysics is bound to react upon you as you affect it. Were it not for the real serious bus iness of training and bringing the best out of yourself the business of bring ing happiness out of this world would be automatic. As the world has grown complex, more and more study of the relation of each individual to his surroundings has been necessary. There are certain qualities that be long to you yourself. Your most de voted friend cannot force them on you. Your most relentless enemy cannot take them away. They are far more potent and vital than any extraneous gifts that Fortune or Chance can pos sibly bring you. They are a free gift of your inheritance. If you are well endowed with them and also with the fun spirit which will make the most of them, you are a fortunate soul, equipped to meet the world. If your birth has been niggardly with these qualities, then all your life you work to disadvantage, but if your self be mostly of the right spirit you will triumph anyway. Naught stands between you and the world but yourself. You say, superficially, “My duty in this world is to others, —not to my- PARLIAMENT OF NATIONS Prof. Nathaniel Schmidt of Cornell University is in good company in pre dicting an international parliament to prevent wars. Over half a century ago Victor Hugo rhapsodized about the United States of Europe. In the world’s peace congress held in Paris in August, 1849, a great Eng lishman and a great Russian embraced each other, while Hugo pronounced a benediction. But within five years the Crimean war came on. It was not long after another world peace con gress that Hugo was cooped up in Paris by the Prussians. No doubt most of the men in the English trench es in early youth recited with fine ser ver, the lines of Tennyson— “ Till the war-drum throbb’d no long er and the battleflags were furl’d In the parliament of man, the feder ation of the world.” From the hundreds of pulpits for two millenniums men have quoted the prophecies of Isaiah and Micah, in identical language: “And they shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks; na tion shall not lift sword against na tion, neither shall they learn war any the Baltic and is waging successful submarine warfare in that ocean. The pinch of war is bitterly felt in every country. France suffers partic ularly from the enemy occupying her soil. In Germany pure wheat bread has not been tasted for more than a year, and now meat has been taken away as a regular diet. Foreign trade has collapsed, and it is hard to figure how the German government can stag ger under its war debt. Indeed, were victory in sight the need of an enormous indemnity would be Germany’s greatest incentive for continuing the war. Russia, which has borne the great bulk of the war on land has fought all the central powers—Germany, Aus tria, and Turkey—has been blocked from commerce with the world over her principal highways, the Black and the Baltic seas. Her exports have dwindled to the vanishing point, and the capacity of her open ports is ex hausted importing war material alone. The least suffering of the contend ing parties is England, and England, furthermore, has the tradition of be ing the most obstinate of foemen. Yet England herself has suffered terribly and her political organization for continuing warfare is not intact. She is for the first time menaced in her empire by the opening of communica tions between the central empires and their eastern allies, Bulgaria and Tur key. In a few months at the most the Prussian general staff will be prepared to strike across the Bosphorus for the orient, and if the war continues she will have to do this, as, surrounded and blockaded, she cannot afford to stand on the defensive. Such a move might bring about the collapse of the British empire, which England can not contemplate without horror. Such a move might result in military disaster, as such far sent expeditions , have usually done throughout history, or it might, by drawing so many men !far from the fatherland, weaken the line of defense to the breaking point. Either of these contingencies would | be fatal to Germany. With the exhaustion on every hand, with the deadlock on existing battle ; fields, with the horror of another win | ter campaign to be faced, and with j the hitherto undreamed of possibili ties of an oriental campaign, is it not possible that the chancellors of Europe will find some ground upon which to make peace?—Chicago Tribune. YOURSELF more.” Vespasian dedicated a temple to peace in 75 A. D. During the nine teenth century there were internation al peace movements almost innumer able. Elaborate machinery was de vised. We were assured after each war that it would be the last. With a wealth of illustration peace speakers proved that a really great war could not happen in this age of enlighten ment. But it did happen and the most illustrious advocates of peace, men fit to sit on the Supreme Court of the nations, promptly sided with their res pective nations, leaving peace talk to representatives of countries not in volved. Much has been accomplished by ar bitration. Our century of peace with Great Britain is a striking illustration of the value of approaching questions with the purpose of reaching an amic able agreement. Extension of such an international system should have the suport of all well-meaning men. But so long as this is an imperfect world, war will continue to lurk in the background as a possibility, and it would be supreme folly not to be pre pared for such an eventuality.—St. Louis Globe-Democrat. self.” The truth is, your pre-eminent duty in this world is just to yourself. Only by doing the very highest best for yourself can you do the very high est best for others. No man can teach mathematics who has not himself mastered mathematics. Vou can only tach astronomy so far as you have studied the story of the stars. You cannot hope to make others cheerful unless you have made cheer fulness your habit. You cannot give sympathy until you have acquired sympathy. Not until you have learned how to help yourself can you be help to oth ers. The man who is not master of himself cannot hope to be master over men. Emerson said the best thing a boy got out of college was a room to him self. A measure of meditation is whole some to the growing soul. The wise man as the wise merchant always knows where he stands be cause he knows the worth of pause for invoice. Take stock of yourself. If on reviewing your shelves you find your stock of considerations for others be low, or your jars of generosity be empty, get more of these commodities in your storehouse. You need them to make yourself good to yourself and therefore good to others. The merchant who is well equipped for trade is not afraid to take stock. In his invoice he finds a satisfaction that breeds strength. It is only the man who is poorly equipped to be good to himself and of service to others who shies at self study. His timidity is the measure of his need of self-reflection. —Madi- son State Journal. THE EVENING FAI). (Detroit Free Press.) Time was that when my day was done The evening was a time for rest. I puffed my pipe and watched the sun In giorv sinking in the west. I knew contentment that was real Not longer than two years ago, But now when finished is the meal She drags me to a picture show. No more the splendid hour of peace That once I knew I now possess. When all my daily struggles cease There is no balm of happiness Refreshing, cool, to soothe my brow, No restful hour that I may know, For when we’ve finished dinner now She drags me to a picture show. Each evening I must sit and see The widow’s baby die; Must gaze on acts of villany, The soldiers put to death a spy. A dam destroyed by dynamite, Which drags from her a frightened “Oh!” And every other dreadful sight That constitutes a picture show. I’ve gazed on Farnum’s curly locks Until I wish that he were bald; I’ve seen the selfsame pile of rocks By every mountain title called. I’ve seen him lick a dozen men In combat with a single blow, But after supper, once again She drags me to the picture show. O for the night that once I knew, Before the picture craze began; When once his daily tasks were (through) There was no place to take a man. Then I could sit in real delight And watch the people come and go, But now—l’ll bet again tonight She’ll drag me to a picture show. THE TRAGEDY. When brother Tommy shines his shoes with very special care And stands before the glass to choose the tie that he shall wear, When he discards the little caps that perched above one ear And says that all the other chaps are wearing hats this year, When he invests in scarfpins, made of imitation pearl— His mother’s mortally afraid that Tommy’s got a girl. No more he sneers at light gray spats or coats with swallow tails, Nor calls the fellows sissy-cats that clean their finger-nails. He doesn’t think it’s wasting time to brush his tousled locks, He doesn’t hold that it’s a crime for boys to wear silk socks. And viewing with extreme alarm his newborn fear of dirt. His mother seeks the magic charm, and finds it —it’s a skirt. And though she bravely makes believe it brings her happiness That she no longer has to grieve be cause he hates to dress, And though she says that she is glad that he’s so trim and neat— Far more, indeed, than is his Dad — when he goes on the street, Her eyes grow dim, for well she knows that nothing can restore Her little smudgy boy to her —the way he was before. —Exchange. THE HOMESTEAD. Here we came when love was young. Now that love is old, Shall we leave the floor unswept And the hearth acold? Here the hill wind in the dusk, Wandering to and fro, Moves the moonflowers, like a ghost Of the long ago. Here from every doorway looks A remembered face, Every sill and panel wears A familiar grace. Let the windows smile again To the morning light, And the door stand open wide When the moon is bright. Let the breezes of twilight blow Thorugh the silent hall, And the dreaming rafters hear How the thrushes call. Oh, be merciful and fond To the house that gave All it’s best shelter love, Built when love was brave! Here we came when love was young. Now that love is old, Never let its day be lone Nor its heart acold! —Bliss Carman in the Century. WHEN YOU’RE 21. Life’s race is never to the swift, Nor yet to those who let things drift. ’Tis always lost and never won; ’Tis ended ’most before its run. Still, what do these things mean to me? I’m twenty-one today to see. At twenty-one you don’t care much About life’s race, and such and such; You figure every one’s your friend, You have no broken heart to mend, Your thoughts are kind, your life care free; And that’s the way it is with me — I’m twenty-one. BEFORE THE SNOW. Now soon, ah, very soon, I know The trumpets of the North will blow, And the great winds will come to bring The pale wild riders of the snow. Darkening the sun with level flight, At arrowy speed, they will alight, Unnumbered as the desert sands, To bivouac on the edge of night. Then I within their sombre ring, Shall hear a voice that seems to sing, Deep, deep within my tranquil heart, The valiant prophecy of spring. —Bliss Carman in the Atlantic Month ly. “With all my worldly goods I thee endow,” doesn’t seem to stir up the fuss that is so often made over that shortly and ugly word, “obey.” A trained nurse gets along splendid ly when she meets up with a trained invalid.