Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1872-10-10
Anecdotes of Public Men.
BY COL. ]. W. FoRNEY.

BY COL. J. W. FoRNEY.
from the Washington Sunday Chronicle.l
"Our future leaders-where are they
to come from ?n was the question Of a
friend, short time ago, after an inter
esting discussion on the necessity of se-
curing the best material in the manage
ment of government, society, and busi-
ness. We were looking out of the win
dow of my editorial room in Philadel-
phia. I answered, pointing to the
newsboys and bootblacks congregated
at 1.-THE corner of Seventh and Chestnut
streets. ''There are yourfuture leaders.
That little fellow with the curly hair is
an embryo merchant; that one with
torn trowsers is the sapling of sturdy
politician; that black eyed lad is saving
his money to pay for collegiate edu-
cation" And has it not been so Of
most of the strong men of our times
On the Pacific coast many of the great
houses grew from just such seeds. Sar-
gent, the United States Senator elect,
visited Philadelphia twenty-five years
ago to get work as journeyman prin-
ter, and failed; Latham, the millionaire
who has been in both houses of Congress
and Governor of the State, began life
very poor; Broderiek was in New York
Bowery boy in 1s47, and the railroad
kings, most Of them, began life as low
down as the little Bohemians at our
corner. The sons OF the rich, the edu
Gated darlings of the great families, are
nowhere. Alltheir gifts were SO many
fatal temptations, and they themselves
are forgotten, like bad copies OF good
pictures. s'Itis the rough brake that
virtue must go through ~ aiojs.tiaa-ls
A recent writer insists that a grand
father is no longer a social Institution.
Men do not live in the past. They
rarely look back. "Forwardln is the
universal cry. Perhaps our reverence
for our ancestors suffers, but such a.
thing as great family In this country
helps nobody. Even the Adamses OF
the present day make little out Of their
former generations OF greatness. Thorn
as Hughes struck the keytone when he
said that the absence of the laws OF
primogeniture and entail in this ,eoun-
try opened a vide door to poor young
men, and compelled the very rich to
spend their money in good deeds to
save it from being wasted by their
posterity, and thus great fortunes
change hands almost as rapidly as the
changes oflife. But we must not for
get that many Of the most useful and
illustrious OF the English leaders are
the growth ofthe long years of.study
and careful rearing of their fathers.
One fault of our system is the absence
Of this very experience, and the pres.
ence of 50 much undisciplined intellect
in our public places. Yet, with all
these draw backs, how easily the machI-
merry of American government moves
on; how successfully it survives acci-
dent; how proyidehtially it seems to
order and control itself And, though
we sometimes mourn for our great ones
gone, there is not day that does not
teach the wholesome lesson that no
body is necessary or Indispensable.
Every hour some new man starts up to
fill the vacancy made by the death Of
an old leader, and in nearly every in
stance the new man is found equal to
the emergency. Ours may be called
the age Of Utility. We are not prolific
of statesmen or orators, and politics has
degenerated into poor strife between
spectators and mediecrities. But for
all this the country Is safe. One such
man as Leland Stafford, of the Central
Pacific Railroad, or Dean Richmond, of
the New York Central, or Ben Holli-
day, Jr., of Oregon, or John Edgar
Thompson, or his vigorous Vice PresiL
dent, Thos. A. Scott, may do more
practical good, and has more real pow.
er, than a Webster or Clay. And
when we consider that, like Webster
and Clay, they have all risen from
small beginnings, is it going too far to
say that they may purify and elevate
our politics even as they extend their
great enterprises and enrich them
selves? He who inherits wealth with
out mind is always sure to underrate
mind, but he who by sheer hard knocks
works his own way through the rock of
adversity into affiuence, Is sure to set a
high price upon intellect. And thus it
stands tEat many Of those who have
grown to great riches by their own ex-
ertions have taken every opportunity,
like Asa Packer, Pardee, Cornell, At.
Stewart, George Peabody and GeorgeI
w. Childs, to give literally to the edu-
cation ofthe masses from whom they
sprang. a.5a7s
Why Do Eggs Spoil.
We ifnd lining the shell a thin skin,
which, when kept In healty condi-
ton by the albumen of the egg, Is i'm
perViOus to air. but if the eGV remains