Baltimore Evening Sun (29 October 1913): 6.

Say what you will against the old Eureka Athletic and Social Club, anyhow it butchered only its own members. What a stinging commentary upon the other sporting clubs: for example, the Anti-Saloon League, the Lord’s Day Alliance and the Pentz Society!

A DAILY THOUGHT. The whole progress of society consists in * * * lessening the sphere of legislation and enlarging that of the individual reason and conscience.–Samuel J. Tilden.

The Hon. William H. Anderson in the estimable American Issue:

The Evening Sun has the Free Lance, and he does all he can to ridicule prohibition, but The Evening Sun prints any communication which is printable, no matter how much it may serve to put the management or or the staff of the paper in a hole. The Free Lance himself, though much of the stuff which he puts out is positively absurd, is fair enough to print even things which reflect on him most, or most completely catch him in a corner, and trusts to his wits to get out of the difficulty; but he does not SUPPRESS anything.

Well, what is there to suppress? The best arguments against prohibition are the arguments in favor of it. But be that as it may, I take judicial notice of the Hon. Mr. Anderson’s apparently honest (as it is undoubtedly deserved, and even modest) compliment, and hasten to reciprocate with a bath of goose grease. He is a shrewd and poisonous antagonist, a plausible and insidious rabble-rouser, a master of persuasive English and a high-toned gentleman. Further, he is a neat dresser, a sound judge of victuals, a talented theologian, an expert accountant, a good swimmer, a lifelong Democrat, a passable political economist, a first-rate amateur horse doctor, a master of the Greek aorist, a passionate buttermilk bibber and the peer of the Hon. Ed. Hirsch as a banjo player.

Of all the consecrated moralists who now rage and chew the air in our suffering city, the Hon. Mr. Anderson is the only one whose sincerity is proof against cross-examination, and the only one who ever offers arguments which appeal to the intelligence as well as to the diaphragm. He has converted me to local option on seven separate and distinct occasions, and each time it took six brewers and a professional logician to haul me back. He plays the game according to fair rules; he is fertile in mare’s nests and libels; he has surpassing skill at dragging a herring across the trail; he has courage in the face of adversity; he knows how to take punishment like a man. In brief, I revere and venerate the fellow, as much as I detest his paralogies, and it is one of my bitter regrets that a previous engagement will make it impossible for me to meet him in Heaven.

What is more, he is surrounded by aids and camerlengos of the same praiseworthy kidney, and so it is a genuine pleasure to oil them all. For example, the Hon. Charles Levister, an inept and ignorant student of Holy Writ, but an excellent clarinetist, a fair poet, a talented lawn-tennis player, and one of the mildest buccaneers who ever scuttled a kaif. And don’t forget the Rev. Cy Keen, missionary to the Eastern Shore! Cy has all of the geniality of a successful saloonkeeper, and none of the regrettable cupidity. He is an earnest and honest young man, and would have made a good newspaper reporter. He will be an excellent successor to the Hon. Mr. Levister when the latter is moved up to succeed the Hon. Mr. Anderson, after the latter is hanged by baffled bibuli.

Of the gentlemen who constitute the Anti-Saloon League’s headquarters’ committee I know less, but what little I hear is very flattering. The Hon. Young Cochran needs no praise from these lips: he carries virtue to the verge of a vice. And the elders who sit with him are all worthy and honorable men: the Hon. H. S. Dulaney, the dean of moralists; the Hon. Daniel Baker, the Hon. Charles W. Dorsey, and the venerable Jonathan K. Taylor. These gentlemen are as much in error as Ptolemy and Lamarck, but the grand jury has no concern with them, and not even the gossip in the kaifs lays hypocrisy at their doors. They actually believe what they preach, and believing it, it is no wonder that they grow excited over it. What a year in Munich would do for them! How it would mellow, denaturize and gemüthlichate them!

As for the Rev. Dr. J. F. Heisse, chairman of the board, he is a clergyman of the highest reputation, both for learning and for piety. I happen to live in his parish, and if I were not compelled to work on Sundays, I should be a frequent hearer of his sermons, which I read with diligence and to my profit whenever they are reported in the newspapers. He has talents which fit him for large enterprises: I hereby nominate him for bishop, subject to the Progressive primaries. Which leaves the Hon. J. Bibb Mills, LL. B.—dear old Bibb, the League juriconsult!— and the Rev. Dr. D. DeWitt Turpeau, the estimable manager of the colored branch. Of Dr. Turpeau I hear praise from Caucasian, Mongol and Ethiop, and even the Hon. Lloyd Wilkinson is proud to shake the honest hand of Bibb.

This covers the whole camorra and brings me to the end of my greasing. Let no man ever say that I have been outdone in oleaginous ardor by a lowly howler in Sunday-schools, a manufacturer of pious statistics, a tempter of the bankrupt clergy. My amour propre demands that I beat this gent in lubrication, just as it demands that I beat the Hon. Charles J. Bonaparte, that gifted fox of virtue, in the emission of platitudes, rumble-bumble, crocodile tears and piffle. Swelling up in the moral manner, I defy these great virtuosi. I challenge the Hon. Mr. Anderson to a public greasing match. I challenge the Hon. Mr. Bonaparte to a contest in moral limericks. And so saying, I say no more.

Warning to the Hon. William H. Anderson: Beware of Greeks bearing grease! The foul plot of the Hon. Blair Lee was as nothing compared to the devilish tricks now hatching. Don’t trust a single soul! Keep your eye on everyone, even including the Hon. Bibb Mills! Something doing in chicanery!

Headline from the estimable Hot Towel of this morning:

WANT OCEAN LINERS “DRY.” Woman’s Christian Temperance Union Delegates Pass Resolution.

Let up, dear hearts, let up: We have given you the land; let us keep the high seas! There is such a thing as seasickness: would you have us fight it with ginger pop?

Vote for the Hon. George Arnold Frick, candidate for the Legislature to the Third district. A bachelor and a journalist—i. e., the supreme type of civilized white man!