Life — May 16, 1901 — page 4: what you’re looking at

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

“ While there is Life there's Hope.” VOL. XXXVIL. MAY 14, 1001. No. 967. Papiish a year in ad- ance 8 Juntriestn the Postal Single current copies, fer three munths trom: Vostags i $1.06 a year extra 1Ocunts. “Hack numbers, date of publication, % cent No contribution will be returned unless accompanied by stamped and addressed envelope. The illustrations in Lire are copyrighted, and are not to be reproduced without special arrangement with the publishers. Prompt notification should be sent by sub- seribers of ‘any change of address. G \ ENERAL JAMES M. BELL, a Lieutenant- Colonel in the regular army, has come home from the Philippines. A Wash- ington dispatch quotes him many can- did and edifying things about those islands. There are great commercial possibilities in them, he thinks; immense forests, and very likely chances in hemp, sugar and rice. Great American fortunes will yet be made in the Philippines,” says General Bell. He says the climate is good too, but estimates that in the last two years one-sixth of the natives of Luzon have been killed or have died of dengue fever. He think: ba, too, is full of commercial possibilities, and deplores as an immeasurable mistake the Teller resolution promising inde- pendence to the Cubans. The candor of General Bell's dis- course and the simple frankness of his attitude are rather appalling. The good old rule seems good enough for him, and for a multitude of Ameri- ns Whose views and point of view are like b One of them in a speech at the Home Market Club dinner in Boston the other night, warned us that all Enrope was dis- pleased with us, wanted to joiu against us, was suffering from economic press- rnator Lodge, LPe ure and coveted South America. ‘* We must prepare,” he said, “for war against all.” ance that against General Bell's optimistic estimate of Luzon’s commercial value. Holding the Philippines weakens us morally and in a military sense in our defen: of the Monroe Doctrine. We are getting: to a point where we can do pretty nearly as we will in those islands. It behooves us to do our utmost to put them in such a case that they may be safely and decently unloaded. The slighter the tie that binds us to defend an archipelago ten thousand miles away, the better for us. We don’t need the mythical fortunes that are to be made there. We do need a homo- geneous and compact territory. We must be ready to defend Cuba; a Cuba as independent as muy consist with our obligation to defend it. We must be ready to obstruct the parcelling out of South America among the land- hungry nations of Europe, but we don’t want the Philippines any more now that we seem to conquered them, than we did when they belonged to Spain. To do well by them and in due time gently detach them and shoo them a —that is our business, and it is far better business for us than any of the lumbering or tropical agriculture that General Bell anticipates. The first step of preparation for that ‘ war against all’? which Senator Lodge bids us be ready for should be to unload the Pnilipetnes: Br NB HE President is just now the most popular man in the country. His. journey through the South to the Pacific is a triumphal progress His cordial manners win him friends. His speeches in behalf of expansion, subsi- dies and business are everywhere well received. The country is egregiously prosperous, and heis closely identified in the minds of men with its prosperity Aseverybody knows, his waysare win- ning. California has profited largely, and hopes to profit very much more, by the acquisition of the Philippines, and his reception on the Pacific coast is sure to be superlatively enthusiastic. It is his innings, and only crabbed observers will grudge him his turn at the bat, and the cheers of the spectators. He is a very able person in his line. It is long since an American has been con- spicuous in public life, about whom opinions have been so vehement and so violently opposed, and whose final standing in history is so earnestly dis- puted. One could wish that in the daily discourses which he discharges with such ready felicity, he might dwell more on the golden rule and the moral law and antiquities of that sort, and not so much on our national duty to grab every possible chance to get rich. “« Live and let live” is a maxim which in the long ran is useful even in busi- ness, Talk of subsidies to enable us to get away Great Britain's carrying trade, and of expansion to crowd the other nations in distant corners of the Earth, smacks too much of a competi- tion so hot as to drive its victims to desperate remedies. & NS Og ‘HE current stories of the exhausted condition of the New York stock brokers are fit to stir pity in the hard- est heart. These poor men at present writing are pictured as being utterly fagged out by their incredible labors in gathering up the money that has flooded in upon them during the past six weeks. If they had had to carry home their guins every night they would have long ago succumbed, but luckily they can dump the accumula- tions of each day in the banks and go home light. Perhaps relief will have come to them before these remarks get into print. Oddly enough, while the brokers are trying to struggle ashore out of a morass of profit, the efforts of the Committee of Fifteen, co-operating with Justice Jerome, seem to have been much blessed in securing for the professional gamblers of the town a season of comparative rest. The wonder is that the card-gamblers have been able to compete at all with the unusual speculative opportunities which have abounded in Wall Street. comicbooks.com