The Folly of Tariffs

1916

Proposals for domestic trade barriers similar to those erected in international trade by tariff laws would be hooted down in derision. Suppose, for example, that the States had the right to erect tariff walls and some member of the Nebraska legislature should introduce a bill to place a heavy import duty on peaches, because, forsooth, the horticulturists of Colorado, California and Texas, one year with another, can produce peaches cheaper than the horticulturists of Nebraska. He would be met promptly with the argument that cheap peaches is just what we want; that if they can be grown to better advantage in other states, well and good; and that Nebraska can have more peaches by growing corn and hogs and wheat and buying peaches. His measure would not receive serious consideration. Indeed, many would earnestly contend that the proponent of such a measure should have his head examined. But when it comes to international trade politicians and candidates can go out and plead with the people to shut themselves off from cheap goods and "get away with it." We have hopes, however. — The Nebraska Farmer.

An Authorized Statement of President Wilson's Plans

1916

L.' Ames Brown in Collier's.

No sane man doubts that the coming of peace in Europe will modify profoundly the present conditions of business enterprise in the United States.

Among economists, as well as publicists, opinions differ as to the extent to which the industries of the nations now at war will be re-energized when peace makes them again our competitors in business. Some of our prophets have broadcasted the prediction that European manufacture may then be so speeded up that the resulting flood of products will swamp our industries unless they are protected by a solid tariff bulwark. Others, including President Wilson, hold that America, having husbanded and conserved her great resources while other nations were passing through the travail of a great war, is better able than ever before to meet the pace of her international competitors.

President Wilson believes that the American position is sound, not only because our resources have not been impaired, as have those of the European belligerents, but because our manufacturers have been stimulated and trained by new demands the war has made upon them. They have learned to meet, not only the war needs of Europe, but also those wants at home which heretofore foreign industry satisfied for us. Finally, the President attaches great importance to the fact that the United States has become, by reason of the Federal Reserve Act, the great financial power of the world.

Keen-minded men of every viewpoint are agreed, however, as to the imminence of severe new tests for American industry and as to the necessity of preparation to meet these tests. A period of intense competition looms up ahead of the nation — a competition of peace times which probably will not be comparable to any international industrial competition the world has ever known.

President Wilson believes that preparation for national defense is the first and most essential requirement the Government is called upon to meet. This he regards as a sort of insurance against an irremediable conflagration. But once our house has been put in order, it becomes the paramount duty of the Government to see to it that the most efficient preparation possible is made for the peace which will liberate the energies of the European power for industrial activity. Mr. Wilson already has looked ahead to the manner in which this primary duty of the American Government is to be performed, and he has evolved a comprehensive plan of preparation. It is the privilege of the writer of this article to present from intimate knowledge the views President Wilson has formulated with the object of giving a new and fuller meaning to American efficiency.

As soon as industrial preparedness is mentioned the mind of the American business man turns to the tariff. The tariff is the first line of trenches of American industry, our business men believe, and the first duty of the Government officers at work upon an adequate preparedness policy is to consider the question of tariff revision. Neither the President nor the well-informed business man has ignored the lesson contained in the announcement that Japan already has revised her tariff to meet new conditions; that England is preparing to enact prohibitive duties upon the products of her enemies and moderate duties upon the products of neutral nations at the close of the war; that Germany will revise all of her commercial treaties in 1917; and that a strong sentiment exists in England, France, Russia, and Italy for the negotiation of a commercial alliance.

The Tariff Must Be Revised.

President Wilson considers himself bound by no commitments save to a competitive tariff policy. The Underwood-Simmons Tariff Law embodied his ideas of the competitive needs of our industries at the time its schedules were framed — when pre-bellum industrial conditions obtained. His mind is entirely open as to the extent to which competitive conditions may have been modified by the European War. He does not need to be convinced that these conditions may be altered. He is prepared to act upon the facts as they may be gathered and their value impartially assessed through the instrumentality of a nonpartisan tariff commission. He considers that an earnest of his open-mindedness on tariff revision has been given in his support of the measure adopted at the present session of Congress to levy higher duties on dyestuffs as a means of securing necessary industries in the United States. The President considers his position, as here outlined, to be in the strictest accord with the avowed principles of his party.

The Tariff Commission is the instrumentality through which the President expects the Government to gather the facts needed for guidance in adjusting the tariff schedule. That would be perhaps the chief purpose of the Tariff Commission's suggested journey to Europe, though that would be only one phase of its inquiries. President Wilson is now as thoroughly convinced as anyone that America is not at the period of her destiny when free-trade ideas can be applied in our tariff making consistently with the necessities of revenue. It is an obvious fact, to which a section of the Democratic leaders, not including the President, persistently has closed its eyes, that all tariff duties in some degree protect the industries concerned. Tariffs protect, whether drawn with an eye to protection or to revenue, and the wisely drawn tariff law — the competitive tariff law — is that which balances revenue features with the nicest sensing of the needs of developing commerce and industry. It can be said that the President will study the report of the Tariff Commission with the view of formulating an adjustment of necessary tariff levies which will effect the fullest measure of development.

"There are many paths which lead up the mountainside, but when we reach the peak the same moon we shall see," says a proverb of Old Japan. How applicable it is to the present tariff discussion! Some one has called President Wilson's attention to the fact that fully 50 per cent of arguments among individuals about the tariff grow out of misunderstanding of isolated facts and not out of differences on fundamental principles. He does believe that a clear presentation of the facts relating to the conditions of competition between the United States and foreign countries will go far toward weeding out differences of opinion attributable to lack of information; so far that it will be possible to formulate a tariff policy for the United States which will command the support of an overwhelming majority of the people of the country regardless of partisan affiliations. The possibility of such an approximate agreement on a subject that hitherto has divided the electorate into two antagonistic sections is attributable in large measure (the President considers) to the development of independent thinking among the voters.

The great body of the people (Mr. Wilson believes) have made up their minds that the industries of the country ought not to be hampered by a too strict adherence to abstract tariff theories, but that the fullest measure of opportunity should be opened to them so long as the conferring of special privileges is avoided. On the other hand (as the President understands the public mind) there is the conviction that our industries ought not to be fattened to the point where apoplexy is threatened; but again, the conviction is just as clear that it would be the height of national folly to lower the entire range of tariff duties to such an extent that, coincidentally, the Government would be deprived of an important part of its accustomed revenue and the industries of all of their accustomed re-enforcement. So much for the President's views on the tariff, which relate solely to the defensive preparation of American business for the tests to come at the end of the war. The President believes that the aggressive and buoyant spirit of American business is such that it will be more concerned with offensive measures, with preparation to wade into the markets of the world, and to establish American supremacy there.

The President's policy includes numerous legislative and executive steps through which this preparation is to be accomplished. Most important of these is his plan to procure definitive authorization for American firms to co-operate for foreign-selling operations without regard to the provisions Of the Sherman Anti-Trust Law. The President recognizes that in the past the American Government has been somewhat provincial in its attitude toward this need of our export business. The war and the vigorous investigation by the Federal Trade Commission have orientated the President and the Government, however. Now it is realized that the great competitive strength of Germany and the other industrial nations of Europe in the past has been due in large measure to the freedom with which their industries were permitted to organize for purposes of foreign trade. In Europe individual companies of one nation did not need to meet ruinous competition of other nations. They could present a solid national front. This was accomplished through the organization of syndicates and cartels which have flourished for decades in every great industrial nation except the United States.

Set Business Free.

The President's understanding of prospective post-bellum conditions holds up to his mind the probability that hereafter American industry may have to compete not only with those solid national organizations, but with international organizations. It is because he faces this prospect that the President believes it is high time for the American Government to strike from our industries some of the shackles in which they have labored because the Sherman Law failed to authorize the needed and wholesome processes of co-operative business organization.

President Wilson's attitude toward business organization as a principle for domestic as well as foreign application is different from that which has determined the policy of many Governmental officers in the past. Then the Government was so much concerned with eradicating the flaws in our business structure that it gave no large measure of thought to developing business opportunities. Under the President's inspiration the Trade Commission idea has been evolved, whereby the anti-trust division of the Department of Justice has been prevented from flourishing its sword over the heads of business organizations, merely because of the size of these organizations. Mere bigness is not held to be cause for suspicion by the Trade Commission, which is now the chief instrumentality of enforcing the anti-trust laws.

The Trade Commission has encountered little difficulty in straightening out kinks in commercial organizations which involve violations of law because business men have been made to realize that the main concern of this body has been the promotion of growth and the development of opportunity.

The Tariff Commission will find many ways of being useful to the business world if the plans President Wilson has formed for it are followed. The war has developed new industries in the United States, notably the dyestuff industry. Great benefit can be conferred on industries of this character, the President believes, if the Tariff Commission studies their methods of operation and subsequently the methods of operation and the economies which obtain among the European nations, where these industries have been longest established and are most efficient.

The President expects the Commission to go into the field of foreign tariff duties and to convey to American export organizations complete data as to the existence and effects of discriminating duties, commercial treaties, and preferential rates; the effects of export bounties and preferential transportation rates; and the effects of any special or discriminating privilege that may be used against the United States.

The scope of the Trade Commission's activities, according to the policy in the President's mind, includes the development of plans by which American business firms may best prepare themselves for the plunge into the international markets. For example the standardization of materials, manufacturing methods, and products, so that a uniformity of quality and price may be maintained in foreign markets, will obviate many of the difficulties experienced by American exporters in keeping up their historic endeavor to compete with one another. Another measure approved by the President is the development of a system of accounting which will enable the American business man to tell more accurately what it costs him to turn out his product. The President was surprised recently to learn from Federal Trade Commissioner Hurley that, whereas 50 per cent of German manufacturers can compute the exact cost of their products, only 10 per cent of American manufacturers can do so.

In general, the President intends that the Trade Commission shall apply itself vigorously to methods of reducing the cost and increasing the efficiency of production.

The President is wholly committed to plans for maintaining and developing the transportation facilities at the disposal of the nation's business. His views on the need for an American merchant marine such as will assure American manufacturers means of conveying their products to foreign markets without depending on other nations, are now well known, and the shipping bill which embodies his ideas is now before Congress. The public is not so well informed, however, as to the President's attitude respecting the conservation and development of our domestic transportation facilities, namely, the railroads. With a view to obtaining the real facts about the difficulties confronting our great railroad companies the President has brought about the creation of a Congressional Commission to make a thoroughgoing inquiry into all phases of railroad problems. The President does not ignore the fact that in many instances the State Railroad Commissions and the Federal Interstate Commerce Commission have worked at cross purposes, thereby seriously retarding the development of the roads as national utilities. The President's mind is open on the subject of Federal incorporation and he will embody in his constructive business policy the conclusions which may seem justified by the investigation of the Congressional Commission.

Welcomes "Dollar Exchange"

There are many other phases of the railroad problem, however, regarding which the President desires the public to be better informed so that the Government may be enabled more fully to do its duty by the roads. These relate to credits and methods of expansion, as well as to schemes of regulation; and most important of all, to the spirit in which the public is to approach all questions relating to the welfare of the common carriers.

Another phase of the President's plans centers around his desire to provide means of assuring to the country the most efficient exertion of its great accumulated financial strength at the end of the war.

The United States has more gold than either group of the European belligerents and her financial position is incomparably stronger than that of any European nation with which we are shortly to engage in competition. But the President faces the fact that this new and happy condition has been created by the war and that plans must now be evolved for expanding our credit structure if the nation's industries are to reap the full benefits of our great financial strength when peace comes. The President believes that one of the measures which should be taken toward this end is the establishment of joint agencies of the Federal reserve banks in Europe as soon as sufficiently stable conditions are restored there. He also favors the establishment of such agencies in South America. It is his policy further to encourage American banking institutions to establish foreign branches in South America, where American trade is endeavoring to establish new footholds, and in general to adopt the most liberal attitude permissible while observing the spirit of the Federal Reserve act. The development of "dollar exchange" he contemplates with real enthusiasm.

The Government Must Help Business.

The President's policy may be summarized in the statement that he desires the Government to assume the role of the vigorous and robust friend of American business men in their endeavors to cope with competitors from other nations. This general statement covers not only the measures which have been discussed in this article and the holding of financial conferences between the United States and countries with which our trade may be expanded, but other concrete ideas for legislative enactments and executive acts which will promote the same purpose.

The President believes that the measures which his administration has taken for conserving and energizing American labor are part and parcel of the policy which I have been permitted here to set forth.

—The Fryeburg Post, Fryeburg, Maine, Sept. 26, 1916, p. 8.

The Right to Strike

1916

Railroads are from their very nature public institutions. They have their being in law, and are governed throughout by legislative enactments. Their rates are limited, and within certain broad lines their duties are prescribed. The advocates of government ownership merely would extend the power of government that now lie latent. Private business may and should control its own affairs; but public business must be subject to such supervision and control as is necessary to protect the rights of the public. This raises the question of the responsibility of labor on railroads or in gas and electric light plants the same as that in a store or factory? A strike in a factory makes little difference to the public at large; and such inconvenience as does follow may better be borne than to interfere with individual initiative. But the strike that ties up a railroad or a gas plant immediately and directly affects the whole public. Clearly the cases are different, and call for different treatment. — The Public.

"Thus Far and No Farther"

1916

These soaring prices every time any one can take advantage of a situation are among the things driving the nation forward to a time when all prices will have to be regulated and fixed as those of public service corporations now are, or to something much more radical. Such is the greed for money that very many men will take such advantage at every opportunity.

No well-informed, far-sighted person can for an instant think that our industrial system can go on many decades more without very material changes.

There isn't in reality any competition in business any more. Practically every line of business is a monopoly — a business of course that is open to others; but no matter how many go in the exclusive control continues. Prices are always fixed by those in the business, and the chances are that the more that go in the higher prices will be, for all have to live.

Of course something different will be worked out. No one can predict what it will be, whether it will be regulation by commissions, whether an industrial democracy, whether Socialism.

Standpat people can no more readily stop the trend than King Canute could the incoming tide when he said to the waves: "Thus far and no farther." — The Pacific.

Engineer Stops Train to Do Some Fishing

1916

Lumber Dealer Files Suit for $2,000, His Alleged Loss by Railroad Man's Act.

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana. — Admitting that fishing is alluring, but contending, that business is business, Edgar Wright, lumber dealer, has filed suit for $2,000 against an engineer on the Baton Rouge, Hammond & Eastern Railroad.

In his petition Wright alleges he lost a lumber contract worth $2,000 because the engineer halted his train two hours to try his luck at fishing in a pond along the line.

—The Saturday Blade, Chicago, Sept. 16, 1916, p. 11.

Prize For an Honest Man

1901

With $1,000 in lieu of a lantern Mrs. Nancy B. Irving, a book publisher of Chicago, has started out to emulate Diogenes in his search for an honest man. She believes it an impossibility to live a strictly honest business or professional life under present conditions. She offers to deposit $1,000 in a Chicago bank, which will be paid to the first business or professional man who can conclusively prove that he has carried on his work for a month without lying.

To Rise in Business Life

1910

Some Few Essentials Must Be Kept In Mind, and One of These Is Advertising.

A man may have several carloads of ability. He may have brains and ideas and other desirable things. But all the ideas ever "ideated" will not avail to raise a man who neglects that all important item of advertising. You simply must get attention. Of course, you can get attention by firing off a revolver during office hours, or you can do it by wearing loud clothes and proclaiming your kinship in the sporting fraternity. But most men who have risen from the ranks have carefully neglected to use methods of this kind.

Every office man must act as his own salesman. He must first prepare himself by increasing his efficiency. He must be able to do the work for which he is hired. Not only should he do that for which he is hired, but he must do that work better than it ever was done before. When that item has been attended to it is then time to look about for more work.

The wise employee will keep his eye on the job ahead, or, better still, will look at a job which does not exist, but which should exist for the good of the business. The next step is to think out a selling talk that will get the attention, arouse the interest, create a desire, and bring about in the mind of the employer a desire to do what the live employee desires him to do. — The Bookkeeper.

Cites Folly of Worrying

1917

Retired Business Man Offers Some Good, Homely Philosophy Based on Long Experience

A retired business man now living in a soldiers' home writes the following letter to a friend in the dry goods market, and its homely philosophy and confidence will be found refreshing:

"Since I saw you I have entered on my seventy-seventh year. My experience has taught me the folly of worrying over events I cannot control. I have much reason for gratitude, as I have been allowed to live long. My lines are cast in pleasant places, and that is more than many a millionaire can truly say. I have little sympathy for people who mourn their former prosperity, just making themselves miserable and their hearers uncomfortable.

"My five months' captivity in a rebel prison showed me how little, after all, a person requires to be perfectly happy and contented. One good square meal to the prisoners would have converted the prison yard into a picnic grove. . . . Even if you may meet with ingratitude, your kind deed is recorded somewhere, and will be remembered. I must stop prosing, perhaps you will think I am getting into my dotage." — New York Journal of Commerce and Commercial Bulletin.

The Modern Figure

1917

Milady's Boudoir

The modern corset for the beauty figures is a bit higher busted, and curves in a wee bit more at the waist than they have for a decade past, but the finished effect is one of suppleness and natural curves. Anything like rigidity or the stiffness caused by tight lacing is avoided and the new corset is quite as comfortable as the almost boneless model, reaching just above the waistline, which the "natural figure" demanded. Figures are better taken care of by the corset, which offers a little support to the bust and rises just high enough above the waistline not to cut into the flesh when its wearer bends or sits, as the very low girdle corset was apt to do.

This support of the bust is essential in the new basque frock or the snug-fitting girdle dividing bodice and skirt. If they are fitted over a low-bust corset, the unsupported bust bulges over the upper edge and gives a bad line.

The brassiere is an important adjunct to the modern figure, for the new corset-covers of net and chiffon are soft and transparent and something must be worn to hide the corset and break the top line. If the outer blouse is not of transparent stuff, brassieres and corset-cover may be combined in one garment. The material must be firm enough to hold the figure, but under the blouse or chiffon bodice, which demands an equally flimsy corset cover, must be worn a little brassiere of one sort or another.


Every Day Etiquette

"When a new employee comes into the office and is introduced to me, should I rise and shake hands or simply acknowledge the introduction while sitting?" inquired Mabel, the stenographer.

"It is a business affair. You should certainly rise but need not shake hands unless he extends his hand to you. A courteous bow is only necessary in such cases," said her older business friend.

Women as Fortune Builders

1917

I observe and you will notice that notwithstanding the great incursion of women of late years into one or another department of business they are not of much account as fortune builders.

Some of them earn or make a good deal of money, but they seldom get rich by their own exertions, and nearly all the rich women have inherited fortunes from men. Moreover, the women who are most successful as money makers are not, as a rule, the most successful as women.

The women seem to be a consecrated sex, too valuable to be employed in mere money getting. Vast numbers of them earn a living, sometimes a good one, and have to, but few of them get rich.

It is common for a young man to start out deliberately to accumulate a fortune. It is very uncommon for a young woman to do so. She is much more likely to accumulate a young man. — E. S. Martin in Atlantic.

Office Boy Always Potential Boss

1910

By Jonas Howard

"Every office boy is a potential office manager. Every clerk is a potential head of the firm. The talk that the day of opportunity is past is all rot. The chance to 'work up' is as good as ever. It always is up to the boy."

These little extracts from the philosophy of James B. McMahon, whose recent election as first vice-president of the American Cotton Oil Company of New York supplemented his old position as vice-president of the N. K. Fairbank Company of Chicago, are worth the reading and remembering. The difference between them and the casual optimisms of the ordinary giver of "advice to the young" is that they emanate from a man who has the right to talk, especially along this line. Mr. McMahon does not say what he does simply because he believes it. He knows. Mr. McMahon began his career as an office boy with the firm of which he now comes near being the head.

The story of McMahon is a good, inspiring idea with which to begin the new year. It reeks with hope and optimism and has results to back it up. McMahon now is only 43 years old and from a start humble enough to suit anybody he has mounted pretty near to the heights of business success.

He was 14 when he began in the New York office of the Fairbank company. That was 28 years ago. There was nothing spectacular or meteoric about the boy. There are probably thousands of office kids around the country at this moment who show as much promise as did he. He was just a common office boy who had to work for a living and he did nothing but work, work hard, for his subsequent promotions.

He moved naturally from ordinary office boy to ordinary clerk and it wasn't until he was placed in charge of the export shipping business that the future began to promise much. There he displayed the ability that won him the confidence of his superiors and in 1896 he was appointed general sales manager and came to Chicago.

Chicago has been the scene of his most important activities, but he had won his spurs before he came here. It is easy enough to continue as a success; where the thousands fail is in making the big step upward.

Good Business Men

1899

Richard Cadbury, who died in Jerusalem in the spring of the present year, was one of those hard-working men who build up their own fortunes, and in doing so make the fortunes of many whom they employ. When his father died, thirty-eight years ago in Birmingham, England, Richard and his brother George found themselves the proprietors of a grocery business, one of the features of which was the manufacture of cocoa and chocolate. In it were employed a dozen men.

The sons determined to devote themselves entirely to the making of chocolate and cocoa. To-day the firm employs twenty-four hundred people in its extensive works on the outskirts of Birmingham, and the populous little town of Bournville is wholly dependent on the Cadbury enterprise for its existence.

It was, however, in relation to his workmen and workwomen that the best side of the successful business man was manifested. As prosperity came to him he allowed a share of it to fall in their way. And he not only showed by his conduct that he believed master and men to be one in aim and interest, but also that he recognized a higher Master of the business than Richard Cadbury.

The day's labors were always begun by gathering the people together for a few minutes of quiet acknowledgment of dependence on the goodness of God, and His ever-mindful care.

Richard Cadbury and his brother had a personal interest in every worker. When the women left the firm to get married, — the only thing they ever left for, — the brothers knew just where they went and how they were getting on. Such simple friendliness between employer and employed is the best check to the spirit of suspicion that in the present day divides the worker from the capitalist. — Youth's Companion.

A Lawyer's Jokes

1899

Many lawyers are accustomed to relieve the practice of their profession with merry jests. There was one famous lawyer of Philadelphia, Judge Peters, who began his career with a joke, and is said to have ended it in the same way, although most of his jests were of a mild and gentle sort, and not at all uproarious — and they were often at his own expense.

A Philadelphia paper relates that immediately after his admission to the bar, and while still very young, Mr. Peters "hung out his shingle" in the shape of a sign in which these words were inscribed:

RICHARD PETERS, ATTORNEY-AT-LAW.
BUSINESS DONE HERE AT HALF PRICE.
(N. B. — HALF DONE.)

He averred that his sign drew him so much business at the very start that he was soon able to charge full rates and guarantee thorough attention to business. His friends, however, declare that he never did anything otherwise than thoroughly. In his last years, Judge Peters, being much interested in real estate, attempted to develop a suburban tract which he owned, and to encourage it he put up on the ground a plan of the locality, covering it, on a post, with a carefully constructed glass case. He was asked why he did that.

"Oh," he said, "if I leave it exposed every hunter who comes along will riddle it with shot — and then everybody will see through my plan!"

The scheme did not succeed, and some one advised him to have the property officially laid out, which had never been done.

"All right," said the judge, "it's time to lay it out. It's been dead long enough!" — Youth's Companion.

Objects To Boys Sewing In School

Illinois, 1910

We received a very strong letter this week from a mother protesting against her boy being taught sewing in school when the time is needed to each branches more suitable for the scholars, at least the boys.

She says: "I think it's a shame. My son has to put two and three hours a week at sewing when they don't half know their arithmetic. John forgot to bring something to sew on this morning, so his teacher sent him home at 11:15 a.m. to get something to sew on, and as I was not at home he couldn't find anything, and when he went back to school again he forgot it. Well, his teacher got angry and shook him and sent him down to the principal. The principal sent him home, with a note and told him he couldn't come back to school again until his father came with him.

"I think it's an outrage in these civilized times to waste two and three hours a week at something they will never have any use for. I think every mother ought to sign a petition to have such nonsense stopped and to have that time devoted to the need of the times, which is business. I think it a shame taxpayers have to pay for such nonsense."

—Suburbanite Economist, Chicago, Oct. 28, 1910.


His Accent

An American-born girl was boasting of her English ancestry in public, and said: "Grandpa has lived in this country over 40 years, but he's just as English in his accent as when he went to Oxford; for instance," she added, "he still says horanges!" — Harper's Magazine.

No Equal Suffrage Movement in France After the American Fashion

1920

By Mme. Clemenceau-Jacquemaire, in New York Times

So far as I have been able to observe, there is no equal suffrage movement in France in the sense that you in America regard a movement. From earliest times the women in France have always held a high position in the community. They have taken an active part in business projects, and the professions have always been open to them. They have been prominent in literature, science, and art. Indirectly they have exerted great influence on the political life of the country. Consequently there has been no pronounced movement for equal rights in France such as has been started elsewhere.

The women of France are not anxious to vote or to be elected to office. Therefore I am not of the opinion that suffrage will gain headway in my country. Nevertheless I am watching with great interest the progress of the women of other countries. We admire your progressiveness and are interested in the experiment of sending women to congress, of giving them seats on the bench. This is, of course, in line with your advancement and liberal ideas. But our own traditions, our social and racial conditions, are very different.

I find no cause for anxiety regarding the competition of the sexes in business. Women who had taken men's jobs on the outbreak of the war are gladly relinquishing them, and peace adjustment is coming without bitterness.

Was it not Ellen Key who avowed that even if the suffragist was striving to be free she was making a mistake if she thought the vote would free her from the limitation of nature? Women cannot pass beyond those limits without interfering with the rights of nature and the potential child. Woman, of course, has a right to avoid marriage, and to allow herself to be turned into a third sex, provided she finds in this her greatest happiness. But when all is told, motherhood is the central factor of existence for most women.

Wife of Mexican Millionaire's Curious Hiding Place for Money

1915

Really Odd "Savings Bank"

With the coming of the pay envelope for women has developed the evolution of the broken-nosed teapot as a savings bank. Many and varied are the methods women have worked out to save money, although it is only within the last fifty years that the average woman has had to consider the problem individually. With their "going to business," however, questions of finance and investment have come to them.

Many amusing incidents of the broken-nosed teapot as a savings bank have come to light. There is a story of Pedro Alvaredo, the peon millionaire of Parral, Mexico, whose mines yielded silver so fast that he could not spend it, though he bought pianos and ponies by the carload, and all the metal work in the palace that stood where his old adobe hut had once been built was of silver.

Alvaredo had no faith in banks and kept great quantities of cash in his house. Naturally, much of this came into the hands of Senora Alvaredo. The senora had a special bed quilt which always covered her at night and was never far away in the day time. When the senora died her maid went to Alvaredo and asked for the quilt. But Alvaredo was superstitious and disliked to give away anything to which his wife had been so much attached. He offered the woman money instead and, though dollars were no longer flowing in at the rate of 30,000 a day, he was generous in the matter. But the girl insisted that she would have no memorial of her mistress but the quilt.

Finally Alvaredo's suspicions were thoroughly aroused and he ripped the quilt to pieces. It contained $30,000 in $1,000 pieces. Among them was a letter from the senora saying that she had saved the money for her two sons and directed that it be put in the bank to their credit. And now the young men are being educated in an American college upon the interest of their mother's savings. — From the Business Woman's Magazine.

Bereavement in Bombay — Bad English

1906

Lady Curzon made a point of collecting any amusing attempts made by Hindus to write English that came under her notice and had many curious specimens in her scrap book.

Once she got from Bombay a letter that two brothers sent out to their patrons on the death of their father, who had been the head of the firm. It ran:

"Gentlemen: We have the pleasure to inform you that our respected father departed this life on the 10th inst. His business will be conducted by his beloved sons, whose names are given below. The opium market is quiet and Mal. 1500 rupees per chest. O, death, where is thy sting? O, grave, where is thy victory? We remain, etc." — London Standard.

Nuggets — "Genius is Inspiration"

1907

Genius is inspiration. Talent is perspiration.

Do not measure your enjoyment by the amount of money spent in producing it.

Education turns the wild sweetbrier into the queenly rose.

A vigorous initiative and strong self faith make up the man of power.

Be sure that the honors you are striving for are not really dishonors.

What men get and do not earn is often a curse instead of a blessing.

You can purchase a man's labor, but you've got to cultivate his good will.

Ignorance itself is a disease, the deepest, most treacherous and damning malady of the soul.

Worry poisons the mind just as much as a deadly drug would poison the body and just as surely.

While you stand deliberating which book your son shall read first, another boy has read both. — Success Magazine.

The Poetic Form — Why Less Poetry Today Than in the Past?

1919

The Poetic Form

Perhaps it is but the child of fancy temporarily coupled with pessimism, but it does seem as though there was little poetry being written nowadays that can compare with the stately and heart-searching work of the old masters. Yet there never was a time when those who use the rhythmic method of expression had a greater and more expert mastery of form, and when there was so large a number of men of education from whose ranks great poets might be expected to rise.

Almost any one can reel off the names of the great poets of the past, but who knows the names of the great poets of today? Isn't the dearth of them explained by the fact that the poetic form of expression belongs not at all in a day when business is the god of men. The poetic form is graceful and pretty and thrilling, when linked with a great theme, but the rules governing its use tend toward indirection of statement and confusion of thought. Or at least, as compared with the possibilities of the prose form the poetic form lacks practicability. And this is a practical age.

The fact that poetry depends for its charm largely on the rhythm and similarly-sounding line endings makes it a poor rival with prose in the minds of the average man of business; and the fact that prose does not bar a poetical expression of thought tends to further confirmation in practical minds that they haven't time to bother with trying to find out what the poet is trying to say.

—The Evening State Journal and Lincoln Daily News, Lincoln, NE, Feb. 7, 1919, p. 8.

Advice Worth Reading, Heeding for Good Business, Success

1878

It is easier to be a good business man than a poor one. Half the energy displayed in keeping ahead that is required to catch up when behind will save credit, give more time to business, and add to the profit and reputation of your work. Honor your engagements. If you promise to meet a man, or do a certain thing at a certain moment, be ready at the appointed time.

If you go out on business, attend promptly to the matter in hand, and then as promptly go ahead on your own business. Do not stop to tell stories in business hours. If you have a place of business, be found there when wanted. No man can get rich by sitting around stores and saloons. If you have to labor for a living, remember that one hour in the morning is better than two at night.

If you employ others, be on hand to see that they attend to their duties, and to direct with regularity, promptness and liberality. Do not meddle with any business you know nothing of. Time is money. Never use quick words, or allow yourself to make hasty or ungentlemanly remarks to those in your employ, for to do so lessens their respect for you and your influence over them.

Help yourself and others will help you. Be faithful over interests confided to your keeping, and in all good time your responsibilities will be increased. Do not be in too great haste to get rich. Do not build until you have arranged and laid a good foundation. Do not — as you hope to work for success — spend time in idleness. If your time is your own, business will suffer if you do; if it is given to another for pay, it belongs to him, and you have no more right to steal it than you have money.

Be obliging. Strive to avoid harsh words and personalities. Do not kick every stone in the path; many miles can be made in a day by going steadily on. Pay as you go. A man of honor respects his word as he does his bond. Ask but never beg. Help others when you are able; but never give when you cannot afford to, simply because it is fashionable. Learn to say "no." No necessity for snapping it out; but say it firmly and respectfully.

Have but few confidants, and the fewer the better. Use your own brains rather than those of others. Learn to think and act for yourself. Be vigilant. Keep ahead rather than behind the times.