Baltimore Evening Sun (30 September 1913): 6.

Moral statistics from the fair city of Havre de Grace:

Excess board collected from touts and horse boys $18,754 Profit on hay, oats and corn 35,740 Sermons preached against gambling 0

Letter from the Hon. William Collier, of Riverdale, Md., in the rascally Sunpaper of August 16:

There was a time when the newspapers co-operated with the home in the proper training of daughters, but that was before vice got front-page mention and virtue a snug place in the waste basket. That was before the newspapers were edited by the Hearsts, the Mutts, the Dingbats and the Menckens.

Letter from the same gentleman in The Evening Sun of September 25:

I join [the Hon.] Mr. Bachrach in his request for the return of [the Hon.] Mr. Mencken * * * We miss him. * * * He is the only tuberose in a wilderness of weeds. He is the only sane man in a mad, mad world.

An affecting example of milder, balmier and more accurate second thought. An undisguised and beautiful conversion. Would that the Hon. Charles.J. Bonaparte were as hospitable to merit, and as willing to admit it! Would that the Hon. William H. Anderson knew how to confess and make amends as sweetly!

My spies bring me news that the Baltimore county grand jury has thrown out the case against the Hon. Spot Mitchell, whose bierausschank at Back River was raided by rurales one Sunday night in August. It so happened that I was present at this raid, and that I was even under suspicion, for a few exciting minutes, of having framed it up. Next day I went before a notary and made oath as to the transactions of the evening, laying particular stress upon the fact that the estimable wife of the proprietor, being in temporary charge of the place at the time, had persistently refused to sell me alcoholic stimulants. So far as I know, this was the only direct and positive evidence before the grand jury. The county cops were far too scared to notice whether beer was being sold or not. Thus virtue triumphs in a wicked world!

All of which recalls the fact that the plupious Lord’s Day Alliance has just closed another season of ludicrous defeats and false alarms. Despite the constant activities of a large pack of amateur and professional snouters, the great Bavarian brew has flowed like water all summer. What is more, there has been more open gambling down the road than I remember seeing for 10 years past. But meanwhile, you may be sure, the Sunday-schools have yielded up a steady shower of contributions. Very few kaifkeepers have gone to the calaboose, but the pickings have been excellent. for the tear-squeezers.

How the hortatory peregrinations of the Hon. William J. Bryan appear to a Frenchman, as revealed in an editorial article in the Paris Gil Blas of September 9:

Connaissez-vous M. Bryan, ministre des Affaires étrangères des Etats Unis? Au nom près, il n’a rien de common avec notre ex-premier, et vous l’allez bien voir. M. Bryan recoit, comme ministre, 62,500 francs par an. Et il trouve que c’est la misère: en vérité, pour l’Amérique, c’est, en effet, un bien médiocre traitement. Et il a besoin d’argent. Il veut vivre. Alors voice ce qu’il imagine: il entreprend une tournée de conférences avec attractions qui formeront un spectacle sensationnel; son agent de publicité multiple déja affiches, prospectus et notes à la presse, le mettant en grande vedette comme “Stellar attraction” du programme de la troupe de music-hall de la “Choutouqua Association de Pennsylvanie” sous les auspices de laquelle il fera ses conférences. Dans ce music-hall ambulant, qui va dresser sa tente dans un certain nombre de villes rapprochées de Washington, les conférences de M. Bryan, ministre des Affaires étrangères de l’Union, qualifié d’ “étoile” de la troupe, alterneront avec des numéros de concert, des exercises de perstidigitation et de jonglerie, des acrobaties de clown, etc. Et chaque soir, après le spectacle, M. Bryan prendra un rapide ou une auto pour rentror en hâte à Washington; il dormira on route et passera la matinée à son bureau ministériel; en deux ou trois heures il peut fort bien régler les multiples affaires extérieures des Etats-Unis, et il affirme que ce cumul de music-hall et de portefeuille ne le gêne en rien.

Cette tournée d’attractions va l’enrienir: il touchera par représentation 250 dollars fixes, plus la moitié de la recette. Et cela durera un mois, peut-être deux: car on escompte le gros succès de curiosité et d’argent. Le spectacle, en effet, ne sera point banal. Imaginez M. Pichon allant dans les grandes villes voisines de Paris, du Havre à Orléans, de Rouen à Dijon, de Nancy à Lille, et présentant des numéros excentriques, des clowns acrobates, des jongleurs et des danseuses de corde? Et voyez-vous vedette sur l’affiche de ce cirque ministériel entre Carpentier, Gaby Deslys Footit, Chocolat et Polalre? Non, vous ne le voyez pas. Nous ne voyons pas ces choses-là, en France. Nous commes très arrières, et nous nous contentons de payer, relativement, nos ministres beaucoup de mieux que les Amériques.

A moins que les Américains, revenues au bons sens, ne brisent les banquettes et ne renvoient ce ministre de music-hall à ses opérations diplomatiques, pour qu’il y jongle à loisir.

The Hon. William H. Anderson in the Letter Column:

Some unknown correspondent, who may be selling horse feed to the Havre de Grace race track, for all we knew. * * *

A covert slam at Archdeacon Wegg, chorepiscopus of Havre de Grace in partibus infidelium? An unmanly sneer at the most discreet of moralists? Incidentally, it is up to Wegg to prove that he didn’t indite the following advertisement in this morning’s Hot Towel:

RARE CHANCE–WHO WILL BACK ME $300 to make $50 a day playing the races; investigate proof before playing money; quick answer. B 3834, Baltimore American. S1tp

The Hon. Dashing Harry to the congregation of Zion German Evangelical Lutheran Church:

Government is not a question of men. It is a question of principle.

To wit, the principle of getting all you can while the getting is good.

Desoute the rumors that the Anderson-Wilkinson bout will be a frame-up and that Lloyd will lay down in return for forgiveness and support, the betting in the kaifs is still 3 to 2 against Anderson. Far be it from me to encourage wagers, but if I had a brother who was a gambler I should advise him to take all the Wilkinson money in sight. The truth is that Anderson is in far better condition than Wilkinson, and that he will probably get a decision in less than 10 rounds. He has a harder punch, he has better wind and he is in all respects a tougher boy. Moreover, he has learned a lot of science since his great draw with Kid Price.

But the Hon. Mr. Anderson will do well to think twice before he accepts the challenge of the Hon. Mitchell Levy, published in The Evening Sun of Monday. Mitch is no soft, spongy Wilkinson, but a fellow of iron muscles and onyx skull. He and I were lodge brothers in the old Eureka Athletic and Literary Club, and I have seen him in more than 50 battles. No opposing gladiator has ever knocked him down. Once he had his nose dislocated, and another time he sustained a compound fracture of the left ear, but he was never floored. Let the Hon. Mr. Anderson beware of this unyielding and lithic boy.