Wichita eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1886-1890, 1889-12-12
The athta aiy gao ghursday ruina petenlber H.

work of farm life was. He used to drive q
| yoke of oxen from his fathers home, in the
| interior of the state, to Davenport or Du-
buque after a load Of lumber, journeying all
alone over the prairies for two or three weeks.
| He was printer, the local editor of q news
paper, an editor-in-chief, a campaign mana
| ger, and yet he frankly declares that the
hardest labor Of his life, the most arduous,
wearing toll, has been in the Office which he
now holds.
Clarkson would like nothing better than to
retire from politics and active newspaper
work and take up his residence on farm.
Farm life is his ideal, and to the farm he is
sure to return in his old age He is type Of
thousands upon thousands of Americans who.
having passed their boyhood upon farms, and
thence gone out into the world to command
success in business, politics. law or other pro-
fession, are never able to suppress yearning
for the simple quiet Of an agricultural life.
In this the United States probably stands
alone among the great nations of the earth.
1t is the only country which must look to the
farm for majority Of the men who make its
laws and carry on its affairs.
Congressman Hit, of Illinois, who was one
of the early stenographers in this country,
las joint debates, was telling the other day Of
a congressman's life. ut is very humiliat-
ing" said he, ito think that our energies are
almost wholly given over to class of work
which requires no brains We are simply
district messenger boys-congressiona dis
trict, mean. Our constituents call US and
dispatch us just as they would any other
boys, with the exception that we are more
do vo+c
Our constituents, therefore, keep us pretty
busy running their errands in the govern
ment departments The only advantage
have over the ordinary messenger boy is not
in brains but in experience. l know how to
do things quickly-to cut cross lots and save
steps, and he does not That is the chief diff
ference. The service of ones country as
representative in congress is honorable and
useful, but it is not conducive to physical
ease nor to the exaltation OF pride"
Another public servant who is far from
being infatuated with his lot is Professor C.
V. Riley, the government entomologist DR..
Riley is an enthusiastic devotee of his favor
tie science, and would if he could spend many
hours in her company. In the opinion of a
learned man like Riley, the running after
chinch bugs and other insects which assail
nations prosperity by endeavoring to destroy
agriculture, Is not pure science, but sort Of
commercial or applied science which must be
tolerated for the sake of dollars and cents.
Yet all of Professor Riley's time is taken up
with chinch bugs and similar pests. No
sooner has he returned from long journey
to the Pacific coast to study the habits of the
phylloxera, than he is ordered to the Gulf
states to famiharize himself with the methods
of the cotton worm. By the time he has re-
turned to Washington with the cotton worm
pretty well disposed Of, a cry goes up for him
in the locust region Of the west. The farm
ers of all parts of the country are continually
discovering new insects, worms and other
pests and forwarding them to the department
of agriculture for examination. Ninety-nine
times out of hundred the specimen is found
to be as old as the mills. Poor Professor Ri
lev doesn't know whether 'twould be better
to give up science or resign his office as gov
eminent bugSer.
Timothy Dunes, of Minnesota, who holds |
the responsible post of chief of the appoint
ment division of the treasury department,
is not finding government service bed of
roses. Bumes accepted this place at the ur-
gent request of his friend Secretary Win
dom, and is trying to do the work of the |
Office and at the same time to keep up his |
law practice in Minnesota. As yet, the gov |
interests have not been permitted |
to suffer, but as much cannot be said of the |
Law practice. As the latter is worth some |
thing like s., 600 year, while the salary of |
the chief of the appointment division is but |
81, 500, it is not difficult to guess which will,
in the end, gain Mr.. Bumes' undivided atten-
ton. ROBERT GRAVES.