The daily gazette., 1875-06-11
The Hard 1imes---IHe Pros
meet ahead.


| From the New York Herald OF Thursday. !
Nations are like families and individ.
uals in this, among other respects, that
when they have danced they must pay
the fiddler. Suppose the case of a man
who had by long course Of skilfully
directe1 industry and prudent invest
ment acquired an estate us great rs that
OF Mr.. A. T. Stewart or VIM. b. Astor.
Then suppose that one day, in fit Of
indigestion. he should set fire to one
third OF his houses, lay waste quarter
OF his farms, and leave another quarter
uncnltivated Suppose him paying the
worknen large price for this work of
destruction, and at the same time be.
ginning to live at an evtrayagant rate
himself. Then suppose, when the work
of destruction and dilapidation was
complete, when he had seriously int
pared his fortune and his income, he
should suddenly take it into his head to
execute a great number of magnificent
but needless And improbable improve
tnents, mostly i'll the outlying aud unoc-
cnpied parts of his estates; building up
ilew and expensive roads which lead no.
where, and erecting costly houses for
no-body's occupation; and that in the
meantime he should not only keep up
the cxtravagant and wasteful style of
living, but neglect his business, let his
clerks abandon their duties, his stew
ards and managers cheat and oppress
his tenants, lose his customers, and suf-
Ter other merchants to take his place in
the market. All this Mr.. Stewart might
do, and he could go on doing it for seve-
raj years. with great apparent glory,
prosperity and comfort. lie would he
employing larger number of men even
than while he was i'll Lis most really
most rr6.pcIot4s days. His income
would Le Iesseaed, but he could borrow
money on his estates, and when lenders
became alarmed he could pay his work.
men with due bills for while. When,
the mt of destructivenesa having ex-
hausted itself, he began to plan and exc
cute costly roads and other so-called i'm.
proyements on his outlying estates, his
credit would doubtless rise again, for
capitalists would be dazzled by the real
and solid value Of his property and the
grandeur of his enterprises, and would
be slow. to distinguish between useful
and useless improvements. Great cham
ges, giving employment to numbers of
men, take captive their Imagination,
and no doubt Mr.. Stewart. having sunk
half his fortune in acts of destruction
and waste. would, in the opinion of most
men. enter on n new career of prosper-
ity" when he began to build unneeded
roads. and tenantloss houses. They
would hasten to lend him money, espe-
cially if he offered to pay heavy dis
counts, and in the state Of madness we
are sppposing, no doubt he would, upon
balancing his books at the close Of the
year, regularly thank Heaven that he
had been able to borrow money enough
to pay all his debts. In fat. however,
he would also have been borrowing mo-
ney to pay much Of the interest on his
debts, and when his creditors discovered
thlc they would suddenly button ~ their
pockets; 20 use the cant Of the streets,
they wonld ''shut down on him" and
thereupon not Mr.. Stewart only, bIt all
the laborers he had bean employing on
useless works, would begin 10 groan un-
der the h'i2den Of hard times.
We beg Mr.. Stewards pardon for u.s.
ing his name to illustrate a course Of
folly of which he is incapable. What
he would never do, that it is which we
American people have been doing since
1861. We have destroyed, we have laid |
waste, we have neglected, we have lived |
extravagantly, We have projected mag
nificent but often Improbable improve
ments on our great property; and we
have borrowed money, paid our work |
men in promises. tolerated unfaithful |
and oppressive stewards, suffered our
clerks to cheat US and idle away their |
time, let our trade slip away into other |
handl and turned up our noses at the |
rest of the world, because it continued, |
in an old-fashioned way, to reyolve but |
once in twenty -four hours. We have !
certainly had long and magnificent ca
reer ns borrowers and spenders of other /
peoples savings, and if we had all died |
three or four years ago we might have |
gone to glory firmly persuaded that, in
tho eloquent words of Mr.. Jay Cooke,
"a national debt is national blessing"
and the more you owe the richer you
are. Unfortunately good many Of us
have survived to suffer sad disillusion-
ment. For twelve years we danced, and
now for three years we have been pay
ing the hddlers; and we are not done
yet with that iisagreeable afterelap.
Naturally a good mtny OF us find il
business, this OF paying old
scores. Some Respondent souls are rea-
dy to give it up as bad job.
Many dolorous persons imagine that |
''the bottom is out of the kettle" and |
that we shall never, or next TO never,
recover our former prosperity. They |
see only prolonged, interminable stag
nation, just as there were persons dur. |
ing the war who could never see any |
probable or victorious end to that |
struggle. Happily such persons do not |
make up any considerable part of the
people. The fact is, we have |
been very silly, very wasteful, very |
very imprudent; but we |
have still left an immensely great and |
rich estate, which yields us even new |
an income so large that we need not |
despair OF quickly mastering our treu-
bls3. Let us see what Mr.. Stewart |
would do had he really run through
tha mad career which we have ven
tured to suppose for him. He would |
begin by rigidly economizing in his |
personal expenses would dismiss use.
less servants and stop all needless out. |