The Wichita daily eagle., 1891-09-20

The palingenesis of SedgNNick county
Democracy took place on Market street
yesterday, and the regenerated cry of natal
respiration mingled with the exhortations
OF street vender who hawked the eff.
caoy of tape-worm nostrum across the
/ street.
From the early hours of warm morn
Ing the accumulating strength of Jeffer-
sonian principles had been swelling the
Saturday number of pedestrians, and the
| truant followers of conservatism and free
trade hustling back into the newborn
councils of Democracy.
In any political convention it is the con-
versation in the circle on the street and
the colloquial caucus in some recessed
stairway that decides the current and the
course of the day. And it was SO with
this convention.
No perpiscuity was necessary to decide
that. 1t had all all been fixed up before
hand. Harmony was the watchword and
it filed the air in Democratic quarters
with atomic redundancy. 1t spread itself
IN broad smiles on the faces of the great
unwashed; it gurgled upward in unusual
exclamation and found expression in
many an open sentiment. There had to
be harmony
This lack of jarring elements and pres
ence of political concord showed itself in
the absence of lip-to-ear whispering and
committee room conuivances. Harmony
hung in huge chunks upon the wall, pro-
PEELED ready stamping of the feet and
qulckened the muscles used in hand-clap-
ping. Harmony was the idea Harmony
was the war cry in the committee room
and the shibboleth at the convention door.
True, at the morning session, some trouble
arose in the committee room between Ed.
O'Bryan and John Farrell, both of whom
claimed to be representing the Irish con-
t1ngent. This, however. was only a mere
peccadlllo which was at once hidden by
the diluvian volume of harmony.
This was the prevailing spirit of the day.
The convention met at II o'clock in the
morning and passed an hour in love-
feast of regenerate Democracy. In the af-
ternoon and during the committee reports,
in the excitement of nominations, where
to conspire to the common cause of har-
mony, nominating speeches were ruled
out, this concord of harmonious conces-
sions and compromises characterized it
all
THE ADVENT OF DIR. BoNNEY
With one exception. 1t was immedi-
ately after Dave Dale had read the report
of the committee on permanent orgauiza-
tlon. This provided for nine men
on the central committee, one from every
precinct which makes five in the
city and four in the country.
Over in one corner sat a stranger: a
young man such as Longfellow's excelsior
young man might have been. He was
dressed in a Prince Albert, well worn
and dusty, but still setting neatly on a
pair of broad shoulders; in his mouth
a cigar, sticking out beneath a sandy Teu-
tonic mustache. This stranger tilted his
chair back on its hind legs and held a di- |
lapidated and badly ruffled plug hat in his |
lap. He had no vest on and the button |
flap at the bottom of his shirt-bosom was
waited on the breeze listlessly. Nobody |
had noticed him up till this time. He was
a stranger and unknown. A Sedgwick |
county Democratic convention had never |
known him, and among the notables of |
known.
But no. At this juncture he arose to |
his feet and faced the convention. |
He wanted to amend the re-
port of the committee on |
organization. The chair ruled |
him out of order. He sat down and bided |
his time. This ruffled the convention a
little there were few angry glances at the
who was not only unknown but
lninvited and unbaptised also. The con-
Iention, however, speedily forgot this and
he blendings of affiliated companionship
'esumed. 1t was not until after the NOM
nations had been made the crowd was
Inning ont and the spectators breaking
way that the cyclone camel In the midst
# the hubbub the strong resonant,voice Of
he stranger broke out again. "Mr. chair
nan he yelled, with a slight German ac-
ent, ''Mr. chairman, is this the time lor
business?'': The chair in lieu
# something else guessed it was.
well, said the stranger, Il move a re-
of the report of the commit
ee on permanent organization"
Your motions out of order" said the
hartman.
The strangers neck flushed and his ears
ecame crimson. "Mr. Chairman, he
houted, motion to reconsider is never
ut of order"
Somebody here moved to lay his motion
o reconsider on the table The convention
7as going to set down on the stranger.
The chair was putting this motion when
he stranger. now thoroughly aroused,
elled. 'Mr. Chairman, motion to re-
onsider cannot be laid on the table"
The chair was ratified and didn't know
that to do. The stranger was getting the
est of him. Here Harry Stewart arose
nth bland smile and a mark how plain
tale shall put him down" look of conf
ence on his face. He said that on the
doption of the report, the gentleman,
the stranger, had voted in the
egative and had sacrificed his voice for
But the stranger knew more about par
law than Mr.. Stewart. The {
he yelled defantly, "voted I
18th the affirmative for that very reason"
THE BOSSES BEwILDERED.
This settled the convention. The chair
ian had TO put the motion. The stranger
Did the chairman that it was debatable, !
lok the center OF the floor and sailed in ,
nd he had Bismarck's tongue in him.
Ie went for the convention He wanted {
ne executive control distributed. He {
idn't want it all in the city. He wanted
lch township TO be represented instead Of