The Sunday herald and weekly national intelligencer., 1891-10-04
RANDOM SHOTS.

seem Jnat man con1ned in prison at the
National Capitol ought to be safe from per
soHal violence, yet Henry Jandorff was with
out the slightest provocation, Drained by
FELLOW prisoner. Samuel Moore, the mur-
derer, is well-known to the police as vicious
and desperate character, much given to crimes
OF violence. He is not yet OF age, but he is
quite as familiar with iais as drummer with
hotels. A sergeant Of police speaking of him
to me said:
81 have known Sam Moore since he was seven
years OF age, and do not believe that In all
that time he has spent an entire year out of
jail. The police know him desperate
character"
Yet this young desperado, after numerous
assaults and thefts was allowed to be at large.
lie took advantage of brief respite from i'm
prsonment murderously to assault woman.
He nearly killed her. For this crime he was
punished by ayear In jail year for a
crime like that! 1t is premium on violence.
hoore comes from criminal family and
belongs TO the habitual criminal class At
one time his mother, brother, and himself
were confined In the District Jail together.
He quarreled with his brother over some
trivial matter and tried to kill him. Had he
lived under the Code Of old Draco he would
nave bden dead long ago. That stern old
aw-giveS whose code was popularity sup
posed to 70 written In blood-though bloed
makes very poor ink-prescribed death as the
penalty for the least crime. ssThe smallest
crime," explained the implacable Draco O. stde-
serves DEATH and know no severer punish
1shment for the greatest" 1t is not SO long
ago that our forefathers in England and
elsewhere punished common theft with death
with quite as great alaerity as the genial
Greek. These rigorous methods had their
advantages, after all. At least the offender
operated upon could not repeat his offense.
With the era of Jail reform, inaugurated by
Howard, there came a reaction against Sc
verify. We swung sheer to the other end of
the arc and adopted roast turkey and plum
pudding-sort of treatment even more inef-
iective in preventing crime than the DRAGON
Ian methods or the rough-and-ready days of
the past. 1t was attempted to abolish capital
punishment by the fine-sounding phrase that
tne worst use man can be put
to is to hang him. when that
depends altogether on the man. If
he belong to the habtual criminal class, he
should be permanently restrained of his lib
erty, except in cases where the criminal mania
takes homicdal turn, and then he should be
put to death as ruthlessly as we would put to
death mad dog, and for the same reason
the safety OF society. If society have not this
right, society is a failure, and we should 90
back to the social conditions of the cave
dwellers.
Sardou, the French playwright, is said to
write hand SO fine as almost to require a
magnifying glass to read it. In some of his
plays tho point is drawn SO fine as almost to
- -~e5AAJAh5 1850 w oOC lb
Whether we have succeeded in calling
Chill down is not certainly known at this
writing. but there is no reason to believe that
the Chiiian bluff will 90 through. l am
neither surprised at the action of the Junta
In putting guard about the residence of our
Minister at Santiago and surrounding the
Baltimore in Valparaiso harbor with armed
boats nor at the cry that the proper resent
nv fhn int
should be set down to jfngoism. Whenever
the United States has occasion to take some
little half-civilized Spanish-American Re-
public like Chill by the ear and compel it,
however surl1ly, to behave itself, there is al
ways set or faction In this land of the free
to shout:
"Why don't you take fellow of your
size! What you want pitching into that
little fellow for' He didn't do nothing?
The first reason is that the fellows of our
size respect us for our size and seldom do
anything. The other reasons don't concern
US just now. After all, nations and people
are much like individual men and dogs. A
patience ceases to be virtue, but il the big
one chastises the little one as he deserves a
howl goes up, ''Take fellow of your size,n
when no fellow Of his size has said word.
80, too, small dog will rush up snarling and
swapping at mastif or st. Bernard, and if
the big one shakes him as he ought to he is
clubbed off, The little men and dogs know
these things and presume on them. 1t is the
same with the small nations.
We are not loved in our "sister republics,
at the South The Chilians especially deco
rate us with their disapproval In fact they
entertain feeling of lively hatred of u.s. This
Is partly accounted for by our attempt to pre-
vent Chilli from absorbing the nitrate and
guano beds of Peru at the close of her war
with that country. 1t is true we, or some of
us, wanted them and hoped to get them by
means OF certain Peruvian Claims" provided
Chill could be begged, bullied, or bulldozed
into letting them alone. Those Peruvian
ctaims by the way, created their share of
scandal in their brief day some ten years ago.
They caused one Jake Shipherd to flash across
the national horizon like FREELY only to
throw dubious light on the record of Brother
Blair, OF New Hampshire. Strange, isn't it,
how these professional ''good menn in public
life fall an easy prey to plausible adventurers-
quite as the Innocent fly is caught by the
wicked spider.
Walk into my parlor, said the spider to the
fly; w w
1t is the prettiest parlor you ever did spy.~
And in they walk. But of that later
Inc TACT is Chill doesn't like us and some.
DAY we've got to thrash her until she enter
tains due respect for us-outwardIy at least
The fact that she is little ought to make her
less bumptious; but 1t doesn't. 1t aggravates
her faults while making her easier to whip.
1T is lots OF fun to hunt bear, but when the
bear hunts you it is not so funny. am re-
minded OF this saying OF the hunters-not
sportsmen-by seeing General Raum turn
oil, h.