The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1878-02-16
FLEA BITES.


/ FLEA BITES.
II What ails Barlow, of the Morris RCtGyH,c'
" We have never had any personal acquantauc
i with him that we know of, unless it was TIT
u in our youth we once owned Barlow kni
{ and were occasionally, in those hacyon da',
i delighted with "A song of the circus clown II
praise of the good qualities of one Billy Br.
possibly Il relative Of our Morris trieh
I Yet every few weeks, as if he had cspcCiay
: invited his soul with soft crabs or rancid CD.
bagc, he bcchcs up and expcctorates at le
> FREE TRADER Il bitter swash as gracelcss ait
: is unsavory. Thus the Rcf1rH,er of last week
says
one year and half ago the Ottawa FIRE
| TRADER aScribcd the terribly duh timcsto
"cXravagancc' and oyer-production. Noyit
says: "Why this want and suffering? Lit
rational to say it is because clothing and 70
4 visions arc too abundant in the landg IN.
= sense! Give the ill-clad and poorly-fcd he
, mean, and opportunity to buy of this supr-
Iabundancc-in short to turn generous consm-
crs again-and how soon would that surr-
abundance disappcarm Thus acknowledge
I tllc ldlSlty Oh us pOlu OASIS logic.
Now the FREE TRADER certainly did OF
one year and a half ago ascribe the duh tires
to extravaganza and over-production; but We
remember distinctly having about that tine
written IN article, taxing for text the remrk
Of Stuart Mill that how a country couldbc
Impoverished by producing too much was ne
ofthosc things which he could not understand"
and tried to show that it was not ovcr-producton
but undcr-consumption that afflicted the Ia
ton. Nor did the FREE TRADER then, or Ger,
insist on an exclusive gold basis for our pWcr
currency. 1t contended for cOin basis--gld
and silver; and if the Ref0rmer is honest iIits
protested belief that the RECOMMENDATION of
silver will appreciate its value 50 as to phcc
it on par with gold, then it is also contod-
ing for a coin basis, or its clamor for silvcrrc-
monetization is nonsenslcal and idiotic.
While our hand is in we may as Will coon
and skin the rest Of our kunks. There isan
editor at Joliet who delights in the name Of
StyX. The name is not pleasant by asSoia-
tion suggesting internal regions and bad smdls
His paper is mainly made up of the stereotyoed
cast off contents Of last years almanacs, nut
occasionally he works in an editorial and me
of his latest was devoted to the FREE TRADER.
1t was provoked by an article in which we
spoke of the present demand for gold all o'cr
the world, and in view of it argued the ints-
ticc of demonetizing silver and making gold
the only monetary standard in view of this
abnormal demand and its consequent RAPID
appreciation in purchasing power "Styx,"I
along with some scottish mudsplashng at our
selves holds "r THO ortioio a proof of tho
degcneracy of the democratic party, of
which the FREE TRADER is "honoably men.
toned" as leading organ" Whatever thu" de
gcneracy' consists in isvery lamely pointed out
indeed. When, pray, did the democratic party
ever oppose silver as Il standard and insist
on wping it out and to that extent robbing
the world of currency for the sake Of having
only one and that "the best currency OF the
world?" Up to about 1884 silver, according
to the then legal proportion between gold and
silver, was cheaper than gold in this country,
and the bulk of the circulation of the country
was silver. Then Benton's gold bill was pass
ed, reducing the gold standard, and after that
gold and silvercircuated together, gold taking
the lead. This was democratic policy then
Il double standards nearly on Il par with
each other as possible, But suppose some ma
MAC from StyX, or by the name Of StyX, had
to Jackson or Benton to wipe out sill
yer, of which the country had several hundred
millions at the time, and its mines were pro
ducing sixty millions more each year, and
bankrupt every debtor by the process of max
ing gold the only standard, and doubling It's
power and thus doubling his debt
to benefit the Shylocks, what think you would
honest old Jackson or Tom Benton have said
to such proposition? "By the eternal" we
can imagine he would have said, the impu-
icnce of these Shylocks is equalcd only by
their meanness and greed and they must be
headed of. We fear StyX got his ideas of old
lime democracy down somewhere in the re-
ylons where ms name comes from rather than
rom the hight of legitimate history
CHICAGO FINANCES.