Life — October 11, 1894 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

‘LIFE: THE PRIME, EXPONENT. T iscurious, but I have seen nothing in the papers about that projected Biological Con. gress or Life Show that was to be held early in the fall at Madison Square Garden. Now that the enterprise has {failed completely, it seems to me that I owe a duty to the public totell all [know about it, The idea wasthis—to have an exhibition for the purpose of showing evolution on a prac- tical scale, They expected to begin on the right as you go in at the Madison Avenue entrance, with a microscopic exhibit of all the lower forms of life, the primordial cell, then monads, infusoria, microbes, animalcula:, insects, bugs, hoppers (grass and other), strictly along the line of development, till they got to monkeys. Then all the varieties of the quadrumana were to be shown—baboons, orangs, gorillas, chimpanzees, till finally they expected to wind up with man. The first part of the programme was carried out easily enough, and, as it was to be a dull season with the menageries, there was no trouble to get monkeys. They even went so far as to procure a very service- able “' Missing Link.” But when it came to man, there was the first hitch ; no one, not even a Congo negro (when he thoroughly under- stood the situation), cared to sit and be stared at as first cousin to the ape. However, they arranged this somehow, and after that it was plain sailing for a while, though there was some kicking for precedence between Red Indians, Chinese and the like. When it came to the Caucasian race trouble began in earnest. They had hired a man named Flannagan, expecting to fit him in where he might be needed. One day they had a dress rehearsal, and Flannagan took his seat all right, and proud as a peacock, too, of the place, next to and ahead of a Mongol Tartar. I don't know by what process of reasoning the result was arrived at, but the committee decided that the Gallic race was next in order of development to the Celt, so they fetched in a Frenchman to sit next to Flannagan This was more than Far Down Corkonian blood could stand, I think Mike had gathered that there were to be no further exhibits ahead of him; but when he found that he was not to be * prime exponent” of all that was best in humanity, he struck. ** He'd be dommed,” he said, ‘if he wasn’t a foiner specimen than onny toad ater,” and raised such a row that the management dis- charged him, but not before he had bloodied the poor Frenchman's nose, After he had done all this, and as he was being hustled off between two policemen, he grew calmer and offered to arbitrate the matter He said he would leave it to a mixed commission, two to be appointed by the Mayor, two by the President of his Union, and the four to select another. When no notice was taken of this offer, Mike called off the strike, and, as usual in such cases, was taken on again directly. After this there was no more difficulty till it came to getting the services of a genuine * Prime Exponent,” an individual who should stand (or sit), as the exemplar in his own proper person of all that was best and most elevated in human nature. It was agreed unanimously that of all the races the Caucasian was preéminent ; that the Anglo-Saxon of the Knickerbocker type was by all odds the superior; but when it came to selecting an individual, much diversity of opinion arose, Some of the committee thought that a clergyman ought to be selected—one or two suggested Dr. Park- hurst ; but others had their favorites, and one said if Father Ducey REFORMED. wasn't chosen he would quit. Then there was a freethinker who insisted that the place ought to be offered to Colonel Ingersoll. After considerable ‘bickering they gave up the idea of having a clergyman, and agreed to get some eminent layman, wholly outside of any religious lines, comicbooks.com