The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1888-10-16
7HE DRY GOODS MEN.
The Great Meetings they are
Holding in New York City
FOR HARRISON And MORTON.
The Songs They Sing and the Great
Times They Hayc-Business Men
who Auend-All Day Meet
ings-A Popular Fad.

inEs-A Popular Fad.
Special Correspondence Of The IntcliiOencr.
New YoRK, Oct. l4.-0ne of the bes
clubs going here in this campaign il
that which the wholesale dry good
merchants have opened TO business meE
who have an hour to spare at noon. Il
is not a particularly formal club and il
does not depend on big contributions
big lists of officers and long prepared
arguments, but it gets whomsoevcr will
into an old store.room, furnishes plenty
Of campaign song sheets and leader for
the singing and then expects everybody
to goin rs the zeal OF the party moves
them. The President does not encour-
age the speeches for they come fast
enough without encouragement, but he
does throw in sharp remarks like a
bright toaStnaster ut u good dinner and
in general keeps things moving. The
speakers are plenty because the meet
ings are OF the kind that bring out all the
latent oratory in man, and they are
good because tney come hot from the
contact with fresh crisp ideas. There
are no dull minutes after the meeting
once gets under way.
The only trouble is that the room Is
not big enough. 1t was store.room
once, extending back from Broadway
some one hundred feet aud Just about
the width of the regular Broadway store.
A desk is placed near the doorway
where documents, songs and badges are
to be had, and in the rear is an organ
which hurries up the conservative en-
thusiasts who. can't keep time to the
lively music. About hall way back is u
platform raised two or three feet above
the floor, and ranged along it are half a
dozen chairs for the speakers and the
chairman. There is no other furniture,
for the crowds never leave standing
room.
STANDING ROOM ONLY.
About the time the meeting is to be.
gin tho organ starts up in the rear OF
the room and lures the visitors back past
the platform. Others coming in from
the front push solidly back against them
and when President Fuller starts tho
he always sees a solid jam OF
business men reaching all the way from
the front to the last foot Of space in the
rear. They are thick enough to be un-
under some circumstances,
but judging by their singing aud cheers,
when they egt under way, they feel all
right. Two or three rousing songs lead
them Off always in the right direction.
There are sixteen OF them in the cam
paign sheet and anybody shouts out n
choice. Sometimes "John Browns
Body" is the faVorite tune; sometimes it
Is the solid old tune "Niarching Through
Georgia. or "Raiiy Round the Flag"
or just rs often it is the favori:e "0ld
Folks at Home" The Germans have n
very good song to the tune of "The
Watch ON the Rhine" OF which verse
OF two shows poetry as much above the
ordinary campaign doggerei us the tune
ia above the Democratic howls that como
from their rooms across the street. II
opens in this way:
Dear native land, with lifted hand,
Before my God and man stand,
With love for thee, all witness ne
lswcar true faith and loyalty.
CuoEus.-C Columbia, dear, there's none more
Ny life. myall pledge to You,
Dear land, dear native land, It's my
rollvc and die as Freedoms faithful
guard.
A little closer to the popular pulse is
Marching Through Georgia." which
works in n few OF Cleveland's
shortcomings, in brief, bright lines be.
fore the rousing old chorus.
IIarrI.on the soldier fought in many mortal
Harrison the soldier hOnors both the blue and
Fishing, though, he never went on Decoration
Under the banner Protection. ."-Cmo.
Harrison the soldier worea a Union Army suit;
Harrison the soldier faced the murdcrous sa'
Even tho he never shlrkod or hired substi.
Under the banner Protection. ."-Cno.
That song has the advantage OF stating
facts about Harrison and Cleveland; in
contrast that anybody understands, and
it usually has to be sung two or three
times at each meeting. The audience
like it and there arc very few men in the
crowd who don't join the hurrah in the
chorus. Added to it aud to the other
songs also, the leader has few verses
which run on like the topical song in n
comic opera. They are fresh, bright and
unexpected, and they really illustrate
Senator John Shermau's remark at the
head Of the sheet that "0ne good cam
paign songis worth a hundred speeches" "
TALKING TO TIE POINT.
Between the songs the speeches are
varied. The other day they started of
with John II. Pierce. a Knight OF Labor
from Chicago, then they had Judge
Morris from Brooklyn, a Democrat OF
thirty years standing who had been
kicked out OF the party with Samuel j.
Randall, then very bright Hungarian
business man named Schwartz, then a
Philadelphia lawyer, named Warwick
who is pretty well known on there as
City Solicitor, then John P. Foster, the
President of the League OF Republican
Clubs and then because the audience
roared out mo" to n proposition to ad-
journ, n half dozen more speakers who
kept it up until the merchants din.
ner hour had extended pretty
well through the afternoon. The
TACT was that everybody had
something good to say, and the crowd
felt that they could not afford to miss it.
The Chicago Knight Of Labor was a big
man with strong black eyes, long
ragged black beard and hands which
looked as If they had not been long away
from the machinists bench. He talked
for the tariff. He asked the dry goods
men how they were going to push bust
ness when American workmen, reduced
to the level OF workingmen in other
parts OF the world, would only be able
10 buy the two yards and half OF un-
bIeached cotton domestic which was
sufficient to cover their competitors in
India; and the grocery men how they
would like to deal exclusively in rice
which the American farmer would have
to eat II it became necessary to compete
with the grain.raisers Of India.
rREE TRADE MEANS FREE COMPETITION
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