Baltimore Evening Sun (8 August 1913): 6.

Eheu fugaces, Postume, Postume, labuntur anni--but the ex-Sheriffs still hang on to the mazuma!

A DAILY THOUGHT. The encroachments of immorality are insidious.--The Hon. Aristides Sophocles Goldsborough.

The Hon. Charles L. Mattfeldt, M. D., to county cops exonerated of charges brought by private snouters:

You owe it to yourself, and you owe it to this board, to find out what kind of game is being played upon the Police Department of Baltimore county. You men are placed in a false position. You owe it to yourselves and to your families to find out what is going on.

Obviously, the New Thought in policing has not yet reached the county. Here in the city it is now the first duty of a policeman to keep on good terms with professional spies and tattletales. The favorable opinion of such pious persons is a great deal more valuable to him than the good opinion of his superiors. If he is wise, indeed, he will join them against his superiors. The most serious offense that a cop can commit is to resist the supervision of such affecting archangels as the Hon. Samuel E. Pentz, LL. D.

Books respectfully recommended to the gentlemen of the grand jury and to all other persons interested in the current vice crusade:

“The Task of Social Hygiene,” by Havelock Ellis, published by the Houghton. Mifflin Company, Boston, at $2. “A Preface to Politics,” by Walter Lippman, published by Mitchell Kennerley, New York, at $1.50. “On the Enforcement of Law in Cities,” by Brand Whitlock, Mayor of Toledo, published by the Bobbs-Merrill Company, Indianapolis, at 75 cents.

In the Ellis book read the long chapter on “Immorality and the Law.” In the Lippman book read the two chapters on the report of the Chicago Vice Commission. The Whitlock book is made up of a single essay. In all three books government by policewomen, snouters and old maids, male and female, is subjected to a penetrating and devastating criticism. And all three authors are recognized authorities. Mr. Ellis is acceptpd in Europe as the foremost social psychologist now living. Mr. Lippman was associated with Lincoln J. Steffens in the investigations of municipal corruption in the United States. Mr, Whitlock needs no recommendation. He has fought for good government all his life, and his practical experience extends over a term or two as prosecuting attorney and three terms as Mayor of Toledo.

Some anonymous sentimentalist, raging in last Monday’s Letter Column, thus celebrated kissing:

What thing in the history of the race has inspired man to so many or an great braveries? What but the kiss of a woman--or the hope of one–or its memory?

With all due reverence, Slush, my dear! This theory is one that flatters the vanity of women and so men pretend to subscribe to it in order to keep the peace. But the fact is, of course, that the enterprises of men are founded upon another and quite different impulse--the impulse to self-expression, the will to power. Men would still fight one another if there were no women left in the world. And they would still hope, and dream, and plan, and suffer, and be heroic, and do without. It is not recorded that the hope of kissing some vapid woman had anything to do with Columbus’ great achievements, or with Watts’, or with Galileo’s, or with Pasteur’s, or with any other undoubtedly first-rate man’s. No; the first-rate man is sufficient unto himself. The meaning of his life lies within him. The sole reward he seeks is his own satisfaction.

And we fifth, fifteenth and fiftieth rate men are much the same, for the simple reason that we model ourselves after first-rate men. We may kiss at times--but not as the principal business of life, not as a serious and portentous act. It is a diversion for moments of social relaxation, an act of politeness, wholly unattractive in itself, but useful as an easy proof of good-will. In the same way a man raises his hat when he meets a woman on the street--not because he enjoys it, or thinks it necessary, or even logically defensible, but merely because she would feel herself affronted if he failed. No gentleman ever offers deliberate affront to a lady.

How prohibition works in Maine, as described by a Baltimorean now sojourntng there:

I asked two hotel men whether the law is really enforced. Both are non-drinkers and both are on the right side of 40. This is what one of them told me, and the other agreed: “Not by a good deal. Maine is the dumping ground for the liquor that is unsalable in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. Two expresses run from Portsmouth to Biddeford. One of them, as it reaches Biddeford, is regularly raided by a couple of sheriffs, who confiscate all liquor apparently not intended for individual consumption. By the other line, however, anyone can get whatever he wants. This difference in due to politics. The gang now in control of Maine would lose its grip in no time if it were not for the blind tigers and speak-easies. The politicians and illicit rum sellers are allies. Some of the stuff our people pour down their throats is awful. Over at Kennebunkport folks are drinking alcohol diluted with a little water. It burns all the way down. High licence is coming. There never was a day when prohibition prohibited.”

It is a pleasure to assure the Hon. William H. Anderson that these facts do not come from a liquor dealer, nor from the uncle or aunt of a liquor dealer. The man who vouches for them is the Hon. William C. Smith, formerly State’s Attorney for Baltimore city.

From “A History of the People of the United States,” by John Bach McMasters, vol. viii, page 128:

The work of informing was taken up by an ardent temperance man, and the proprietors of the United States Hotel and of the Ocean Home were soon under bonds to appear for trial, and five barrels of liquor and three kegs marked “lard,” consigned to the Exchange Hotel * * * were seized at the * * * depot.

When did all this gay snouting take place? The other day? Not at all. The time was the summer of 1852--exactly 61 years ago. During the two generations that have since come and gone, the technique of snouting has not improved a whit, nor has its success increased. The prohibition laws of the dry States are still violated as openly and as copiously as they were in 1852. And “ardent” gentlemen still make a good living bellowing about it.

Boil your drinking water! On with the fake raids! Snoutery forever!

Don’t miss Prof. Alexander Geddes’ dithyrambs on page 4 today.--Adv.

The betting odds in the kaifs, as reported by the visiting Eagles:

10,000 to ½ that no one will die of thirst at Back River next Sunday.