News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1893-02-16


wild beasts and the groans of dying mel
while in the gallery the wives and chill
t--'c-l of those down under the lions paw
wrung their hands and shrieked out il
widowhood and orphanage, while 100, 0Ot
people clapped their hands, and there
was ''Hal hap' wide as Rome and dee,
rs perdition!
The corpses of that arena were put OF
cart or dragged by hook out through
what was called the Gate of Death. What
an excitement it must have been wher
two combatants entered the arena, the
one with sword and shield and the other
with net and spear. The swordsman
strikes at the man with the net and
spear. He lodges the sword and then
filings the net over the head of the swords
man and jerks him to the floor of the
arena, and the man who flung the net
puts his foot on the neck of the fallen
| swordsman, and spear in hand looks W
to the galleries, as much as to say, "Shall
1 let him up, or shall plunge this spear
! into his body until he is dead?'
The audience had two signs, either of
which they might give. If they waved
their flags, it meant spare the fallen con-
testant. If they turned their thumbs
down, it meant slay him. Occasionally
the audience would wave their flags.
and the fallen would be let up, but that
was too tame sport for most occasions,
and generally the thumbs from the gal
leries were turned down, and with that
sign would be heard the accompanying
shout of ''Killl KILL Kill! Killr'
CRUELTY ADDED TO CRUELTY.
Yet it was far from being a monotone
of sport, for there was a change of pro-
gramme in that wondrous Coliseum
Under strange and powerful machin-
cry, beyond anything of modern inven-
ton, the floor of the arena would begin
to rock and roll and then give away, and
there would appear IKE of bright
water, and on its banks trees would
spring up rustling with foliage, and IL
gers appeared among the jungles, and
armed men would come forth, and there
would be tiger hunt. Then ON the lake
in the Coliseum armed ships would float,
and there would be a sea fight. What
fun! What lots of funl When pestilence
came, in order to appease the gods, in
this Coliseum a sacrifice would be made,
and the people would throng that great
amphitheater, shouting, "The Christians
to the wild beastsr' and there would be
a cracking of human bones in the jaws
of leonine ferocity.
But all this was to be stopped. By the
outraged sense of public decency? No.
There is only one thing that has ever
stopped cruelty and sin, and that is
Christianity, and it was Christianity.
whether you like its form or not, that
stopped this massacre of centuries. One
day while in the Coliseum a Roman
victory was being celebrated, and 100,-
600 enraptured spectators were looking
down upon two gladiators in the arena
and slicing eacn other to death,
an Asiatic monk of the name of Tele-
machus was so overcome by the cruelty
that he leaped from the gallery into the
arena and ran in between the two
swordsmen and pushed first one back
and then the other back and broke up the
contest.
Of course the audience was affronted
1T having their sport stopped, and they
hurled stones at the head of Telemachus
lntil he fell dead in the arena. But
when the day was passed, and the pas
;ions of the people had cooled off, they
leplored the martyrdom of the brave |
md Christian Telemachus, and as re- |
ult of the overdone cruelty the human |
acriices of the Coliseum were forever |
.bolished.
THE SAME SPIRIT STILL MANIFESTED.
What a good thing, say you, that such |
,ruelties have ceased. My friends, the |
anne spirit of ruinous amusements and |
If moral sacrifice is abroad in the world |
joday, although it takes other shapes |
Last summer in our southwest there oc- |
CURED a scene of pugilism on which all
Christendom looked down, for saw the
papers on the other side of the Atlantic
ocean giving whole columns of it. Will
some one tell me in what respect that
of last summer was superior to
The brutality of the Roman Coliseum? In
some respects it was worse by so much
as the 10Th century pretends to be more
merciful and more decent than the 9th
century.
That pugilism is winning admiration
IN this country is positively proved by
the fact that years ago such collision
was reported in a half dozen lines of
if reported at all, and now it
takes the whole side of a newspaper to
tell what TRANSFERRED between the first
blood drawn by one loafer and the throw
ing up of the sponge by the other loafer,
and it is not the newspapers fault, for
the newspapers give only what the peo-
pie want, and when newspapers put car
rion on your table it is because you pre-
fer carrion.
The same spirit of brutality is seen to-
lay in many an ecclesiastical court
when minister is put ON trial. Look
1t the countenances of the prosecuting
and not in all cases, but in
many cases, you will find nothing but
inspires them. They let out
On one poor minister who cannot defend
himself the lion of ecclesiasticism, and
the tiger Of bigotry, and the wild boar
of jealousy, and if they can get the Of
Tending minister fiat on is back some
one puts his feet on the neck of the over
thrown gospelizer and looks up. spear in
hand, to see whether the galleries and
would have him let up or
slain. And, lol many of the thumbs are
down.
ABUSED IN LIFE; HoNORED IN DEATH.
In the worldly realms look at the bru-
talities of the presidential election eight
years ago. Read the biographies of Dan
lei Webster and Alexander H. Stephens
and Horace Greeley and Charles Sumner
and Lucius Quintus Cincinnatus Lamar
and James G.. Blaine, and, if the story OF
and calumny and scandaliza-
ton and diatribe and scurrility and lam
poon and billingsgate and damnable per-
tidy be accurately recorded, tell me i'll
what respects our political arena and the
bowling and disappearing galleries that
again and again look down upon it are
better than the Roman Coliseum.
When read few days ago that the SUI
preme court of the United States had APP
adjourned to pay honors to
the two last distinguished men men
toned, and American journalism north,
south, east and west went into lamenta-
tons over their departure and said all
things in regard to them,
asked: "When did the nation lie about
CneSe men! w as II When curing Inelf
life it gave them malediction or now
since their death when bestowing upon
them beatifcation?"
The same spirit of cruelty that you de-
plore in the Roman Coliseum is seen in
the sharp appetite the world seems 80
have for the downfall of good men, and
IN the divorce of those whose marital life
was Thought accOrdant. and in the alb
sconding Of a bank cashier. Oh, my