Mower County transcript. [volume] (Lansing, Minn.) 1868-1915, 1885-07-08

THE janitors of the public buildings
in Washington celebrated the Fourth
SO faithfully that they did not raise the
flags in honor of the day. They ad-
hered very faithfully to the general
order to close the public buildings and
did not 60 near the structures. Some
men can be very literal in obcying an
order which gives them a holiday.
AT Salt Lake city the Mormons hung
the flags on the public buildings at half
mast on the Fourth oftJuly. They say
it is not appropriate for them to cele-
brate ''day of freedom" when their
''best men are in the penitentiary.'' 1t
looks very much as though the Nor
mons would either have to behave them
selves or take refuge in ''the mountains
of Hepsidam' or some other foreign
country.
IT is reported that Postmaster-Gen-
cral Villas will recommend reduction
of letter postage to one cent. He takes
the very sensible position that the pos
tai department was never designed as
a source Of revenue but for the public
convenience, and believes that if some
of the money which is now being
boarded in the treasury should be dis
bursed by reducing the rate of postage
it would place it where it would do the
most good.
THE death of Mr.. Seth L. Phelps,
late United States minister to Peru,
is remarked on as singular circum-
stance, because his predecessor Gener-
al S. A. Hurlbut, of Illinois, also died
in Lima just as he was about to be sue
ceeded in Office. The death of Gener-
ais Hurlbut and Fitzpatrick so nearly at
the same time, just after all the Chilli
Peru complications and correspondence,
was one of the most singular incidents
of our late diplomatic history in South
America.
THEY do things up handsome ''out
West.' At Miles City on the Fourth,
a man who was running a wheel of for
tune in tent advertised fight between
mastiff and bear. The dog was a
little fellow and no match for the bear
and the public soon saw it was scheme
to get an audience to patronize the
wheel of fortune. The cowboys would
have been delighted if it had been a
small bear and big dog, but to have the
conditions reversed made them mad.
They accordingly tore down the tent
and put a rope around the operator s
neck, making it sufficiently tight to
cause him to refund all the money he
had taken in.
In New York city they are bound to
have the telegraph poles abolished and
the wires put under ground whether
the companies like it or not. They
have secured law from the legisla-
turc requiring the companies to put
their wires underground by Nov. 1st,
1885, and in case they do not comply,
have appointed a board of three COM
missioncrs to see that the work is done
and charge the expense to the compan-
les. The commissioners have a salary
OF $4,000 each, and as they have al
ready been appointed and begun to
draw their salaries, it is likely some
thing will be done with the wires. The
day is not remote when telegraph CON-
panics will take down their poles all
over the country and place the wires
underground as matter of choice.
They will do this owing to the increas-
ed facilities and permanency it will
give them, and the boys of to-day will
look back at the era of telegraph poles
as a crude and defective system of
communication, just as the men of to-
day look back with commiseration
upon the previous generation which re-
lied on stages and canal boats for
transportation. The telegraph people
will some day be surprised to think
that legal compulsion was resorted to
in order to make them adopt so great
an improvement as underground wires.
THE strike of the West Side car
drivers and conductors in Chicago has
become a very serious matter, and
proves the damage which enforced
combinations, intlict upon the en-
ploye. The car company discharged
sixteen of their employees for what
they allege to be good grounds. The
tabled fox. who, having lost his tail in a
trap, desired to institute the fashion of
having all the foxes wear their caudal
appendages .cut short, was never
better illustrated than by this cpl
SOUc. uc SlAltcu DuCu "cIC ucU-
bers of the car drivers association, and
they induced their brethren to demand
their reinstatement. A committee Sc
.ected from the discharged men waited
upon the car company officers and de-
mandcd the revocation of the order
for their discharge. 1t would have
been difficult for the drivers and con-
ductors to have adopted more suici-
dal policy. but the sixteen men had
nothing to lose by the attempt and
their comrades were foolish enough to
be drawn into the trap. As the result
several hundred men quit work, not
only throwing themselves out of situa.
tions, but greatly impeding the bust
ness of large city. Rioting. law
breaking, destruction of property and