The Press., 1891-05-21
Bridgeport Correspondence of The Courant.)
 THOSE "SPECKED" BALLOTS.

No good reason for further delaying the opening of the ballot-boxes in this city is known to exist, and Town Clerk Watson will doubtless permit it to be done at an early day.
 The interest in this matter of course centers in the fifth ward box containing the package of 125 ballots rejected be- cause, as claimed, they were Intentionally marked for identification.
 The republicans of Bridgeport are anx- | ious to have these specked ballots ex- amined by competent and reliable author ity, and they will cheerfully abide the re- suit.
 The claim set up by the democratic counters and taken up by the rank and | file of that party throughout the state would, if substantiated, convict the local | republican managers of resorting to trick cry of the lowest and basest character During this entire controversy they have been compelled to rest under this charge of fraud with no means to defend them selves while the ballot-box remains closed. For this reason, while the voters in both parties and the public generally have deep inter est in the real character of the disputed ballots the republicans who man. aged the election for their party in the fifth ward have another and to them a more important interest than attaches to purely political considerations. 1t is evi- dent that an examination of these ballots, l which proves that the distinguishing marks were not made by the printing press, of necessity proves that the mark ing was hand aoork, and the scork of dts honest men.
 Politicians in both parties here have great confidence in Judge Morris-repub- licans as we'll as democrats-believe him | to be too honorable and high minded to | to accept position willingly to which he had not been legally elected. If the prop osition were made to place this package | of marked ballots unbroken in the hands of Judge Morris, with permission to call in such experts as he might select to l assist him to determine their real charac- ter, and the result of this examination were to give him the position in issue, or deprive him of it, every republican in Bridgeport would endorse it.
 Let the right prevail. If the 125 marked ballots found their way last November into the ballot-box in the fifth ward in this city through the trickery of corrupt politic- ians to gain political advantage, let the guilty men be punished severely, as they deserve; but, on the other hand, if an ex- animation of the ballots shows that they were not marked Intentionally and that traUd ,oas nOt attempted, should not those who have made these serious charges ad- init their error and do works meet for re- pentance?
 A Litchfeld county Conn., man thus writes to the New England Homestead: "The talk about the run-out farms is all bosh. There was never time when our farms would produce as much as the pres ent time where they have been kept culti- vated and the boys have stayed at home on the land. The only trouble is the in come from the farm is not what the man. ufacturers or merchants is, and the tiller of the soil has tried to support the same style of living as his wealthy neighbor, consequently he has run behind and that
 has brought the farm into disrepute. This is an error which will correct itself in time. a
 FAILURES IN LIFE.-People fail in many