The Louisiana Democrat. [volume] (Alexandria, La.) 1845-1918, 1879-02-05
THE TIMES AND oURsELF.

time since about the "dying year"
1t speaks of us loosely as the "DEM-
ocRAT man." and it smacks little
of envy when it mentions our 'pow-
erful sheet" Well, we suppose we
can stand it, if the Times man can.
Although we cannot claim its stereo-
typed boast of "the largest circula-
tion in the Southwest" yet we can
confidently assert we have the age
| ledge on it-and, like wine, we i'm
prove by age, fact which is more
than the aforesaid distinguished in
dividual can say.
Were we disposed to be critical
we could retaliate on the Times, and
not 'half try" A fruitful theme, to
begin with, would be that 'prize
|pome." From the way the Times
heralded its offer of 500, all in gold
an incentive which the Times man
thought was sure to draw out from
the Southern poets an immense deal
of inspiration-we were led to look
forward to some big things when
that New Years edition should reach
US. We expected an intellectual
feast. The Times was the caterer.
Two of the distinguished Hterati of
New Orleans were selected to be the
Judges. The Times informs US these
overtasked gentlemen were three
whole weeks reading over the $50
poems submitted to them! When,
10 and behold! they turned loose up
on US the ''Dromedary Unchainedr
That was too bad! We did not de-
serve it. The good ''people of the
North" did not deserve tive mean
that sort of gratitude. In fact we
could not see where the gratitude
came in, the whole thing is so beclou
ded with fog and mystery. We fear
those good people, when they read
that poem, will accuse us of saying
"hard words" about them. It is a
sort of mixture of the style of Para
disc Lost and the vocabulary of Au.
gusta Evans, without the good sense
of either.
Our impression. is that among so
great a number of good poems sub
mitted to their Judgment the arbi-
traitors could not decide which was
really the best, until they came
across one written in Dutch or Hin
doostanee, which they did not un
derstand, and took it for granted to
be good, and awarded it the prize!-
and in doing so kept all those hun
dred "yaller boys in the Times fam
lily. To mend matters, the Times
has since been publishing the reject
ell unfortunates' contributions, nine
in a batch, like the Speaker of a
Legislative Assembly swearing in
members in groups in order to save
time. We have suggestion to
make to the Times, which we do
gratis, that is, to take that 800 in
gold and make pro rata distribu-
tion Of it among the one hundred and
fifty contributors, which would be
just sixty-six and two thirds cents
apiece, and in order to make the
change, as it certainly must be paid
in gold, give every three contributors
two dollars; but if it wants to be lib
eral, as we'll as just, as becomes a
journal with "the largest daily circu
lation In the Southwest let it givel
each one of the remaining one hun
dred and forty mine authors Of yellow,
fever poetry a hundred dollars apiece
of "yellow" money, and our word for
r
it, everything will be serene and
lovely, and no one will have the te-
merity to say. the Times is out Of
joint, however much it may be out Of
pocket
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Nor long since several colored
men who were disposed to render
justice to the respectable people of
this community, went down to New
Orleans for the purpose of testify
Ing before the Teller committee,
though they did not reach there UNI
til the committee had left. They |
have returned and give rich ac-
count Of how they were treated in
the city. It seems that Gus. Mar