The prison mirror. [volume] (Stillwater, Minn.) 1887-1894, 1893-10-26
vATER, MINNESOTA, OCTOBER 2e, 1898. ,

leaving its mark upon the worlds pro-
gress. In the beginning they were
nomad shepherds tending their flocks,
hunters chasing their livelihood through
forest and glade, or they were husband
men. In either case the most skilled or
fortunate accumulated more than they
needed for personal use. Abundance
begat slOth, and sloth desire for ease
which they purchased by hiring their
less fortunate fellows. Thus the war
fare OF labor and capital began. The
desire for luxury expanded with in
I.creasing wealth and the number of the
SerVltOrS was augmented Around
the tent of the Opulent the hamlet grew
and developed. Soon the poor and am
bilious, seeing that wealth was in the
cOncourse of men, staked his intelli-
gence against the many to wrest the
coveted prize from them by hook or by
crook. The little whirling vortex, thus
begun, increased into the mighty mal-
strOm of commerce, avarice, wealth,
poverty and crime from Babel to Lon
don and New York. B.
XXX
The movement city-ward of the
brightest of our country youths is de-
plorable. But far more deplorable are
the causes which lead them to desert
the rural homestead. Our farmers as
class, are not prosperous. For gen
GRAFTON past, every passing year has
left them more dependent on specula-
tors, and milling and transportation
corporations. They have no free market;
the price of all the staple products
of the land is fixed by boards of trade
men who bear no part of the labor of
production. nor have care about the
welfare of the producers. The law, too,
discriminateS against the farmer when
it exempts from taxation lands held for
speculative purposes, while it makes
his mOrtgaged quarter-SectlOn do double
duty and cOmpels payment of usuriOuS
interest to holders Of mortgages. On
the face of such conditions it is a ques-
tiOn whether the attraction of cities, Or
the repelling features of farm-life are
doing the most mischief. The rising
youths are but wise in their generation
in forsaking calling that makes them
the prey to every sharper within or
without the law ST. CRIsPIN.
Xxx
LII UlllO SuUJCCU, i Ill
cOntine myself to the influence it has
over young, men and women. The pre-
dominent thought in young Americans
is how to accumulate wealth and gain
position in the quickest way possible.
They see man in cities making large
sums of money without any special eff
forts of his own. No only that, but
they see him win the confidence and
respect of his fellow-men. This is an
alluring temptation to the young coun-
tryman that he finds impossible to re-
Sist. He tries it and fails, unless his is
an exceptional case or is of extraOrdi-
nary character and ability, fails as
thousands have before him and thOus-
ands will after him. He struggles on,
victim to his once glowing anticipa-
tiOnS, till broken down in health he
dies in sorrow and anguish when he
sees his impoverished family fighting
with adversely plOdding on in the path
he has so long followed. How different
and reverse would have been his case
had he been satisfied with the beautiful
and independent country life of his
youth. ONE LUNG.
We have the social instinct ever par
amount. Go where you may, among
whom you will, man will ever be found
seeking and forming society. Rural
life is the unit, urban life the sum total
of society. Country life offers one
means of advancement by the conquest
of nature by laborious toll; the city Of
fers the conquest of the toiler. Each
individual has an inherent sense of his
own superiority and city life enables
him to express this; and, by it's express
sion, to win his way in the life he has
chosen, or lose confidence and be-
come, as some say, failure. Again,
the culture and assumed refinement of
urban existence appeals most strongly
to the rustic mind which looks upon the
city man as one worthy of considera-
tion simply because his life is in oppo-