The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1891-10-30
CAVALIER AND PURITAN.
The Bold SOuthr0n Droops His Colors
TO His Stern Northern Brother.

'Ole OF the cardinal IaQIUS OF Inc
| American character, writes the edi-
tor Of the Texas Ic0R0cIGSt, who ap-
pears TO have fought on the losing side
in the war Of the Rebellion, SIS pro-
pensity 10 brag. Brother Jonathan's
egotism long since passed into pro-
verb. In no section of this land of
the alleged free and home of the ism
does the blowhard blow longer and
louder and with less excuse than in
the South. We are the people. the
nonpareil: there are none like unto Us
beneath the sun! From the empyrean
we look down upon common humani-
ty. talk turgid and swell up with the
vain glory of young turkey cock with
his first tail feathers!
Perhaps it were well for US TO drop
the King Cambyses vein long enough
TO inquire what we are chanticleering
about. What have we ever done that
entities US TO assume airs of SUPERIOR
ty? Nothing in Gods great world:
absolutely nothing. We are so far in
the rear Of civilization that we fool
ishly imagine ourselves TO be in the
van, with the whole world behind US,
struggling desperately TO catch up
We speak sneeringly Of the Yankees
and yet the same despiSed Yankees
are our guardians and tutors, even
our protectors. Without them we
were but lost calf running foolishly
about in circles until some political
power IassQed Us and led Us to the
shambles.
Take the South proper south of
the Both parallel-Virginia and Ken
lucky, Tennessee and North Carolina
are Southern only in name-and how
will it compare with New England?
Here we have a veritable Eden, broad
and fertile savannahs, land of per-
ennial summer, the richest in natural
resources in the Western world. New
England is cold and sterile land,
where nature is ever at fierce war with
man. Yet New England was develop
ed a century ago. Her rocky hillsideS
were made to blossom like the vale Of
Tempe: her mountains were ransac k
ed for ore: her forests transformed in
to stately ships or still more impOs
ing buildings: the hum Of the factory
rose in city and hamlet, and the rich
commerce of a world rolled in mighty
waves over her wharyes. Now we are
stretching out our hands implOringly
TO that Storm-curSed, fr0St-glrt land,
praying that she will send brain and
Drawn TO develop our rich mines, ubi-
| lie our vast forests, build our rail-
ways and teach our children the magic
art of industry: that she will do for US
what we have been too INDECENT or too
| inapb TO do for ourselves. We look to
the Yankees for everything: for our
machinery, our very household uten-
sils, our capital, our books, our higher
education: for brains TO plan and skill
TO direct our great enterprises.
/ while New England has been
making reapers and sewing machines,
/ spinning jennieS and Jelegraphs. we
| have been making foolish stump
/ speeches and moonlight whisky.
/ While New England has been breed
| ing statesmen, scientists and poets,
we have been breeding 'yaller niggers'
and Cheap John politicians! We can
not boast half dozen men born south
of the thirty fifth parallel in the
| South proper whom historians CEN
| fury hence will consider worthy OF a
dozen lines. We have not produced a
dozen books worth burning: in the
field of invention we have done little
more than the red Indians who so
long lurked in our forests.
! DQO II VIC CdA uC1BllC1 WO4h AO4
think we are at least Incompatible
fighters. Behold the recent civil war
and how we did amaze the world.
Amaze it we certainly did, but not in
the manner we would like our child
rem TO believe. Whenever the civil
war is mentioned, the South mounts
TO the top rail Of the fence, flaps its
1 wings and crows lustily-for what rea-
hson it were difficult for an unprejudi-
ced critic to discover 1t is now more
| than a quarter Of q century since
Lees surrender; high time surely that
the foolish falsehood that for four
Years the South contended against
| five-fold odds was relegated to deSue-
tuede instead of being ostentatl0usly
paraded by able editors and aspiring
Ciceros all occasions.
such fables but make Us the laugh
ing stock of the world; cause our
Northern brethren TO feel like thrash
ing US again instead of helping TO de-
velop our country. 1t is fact patent
to al the world, a fact that no honest