St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1894-03-25
RUTHLESS PIRACY.


discovers our superb commonwealth is
being surpassed in a line Of intellectual
development wherein it has heretofore
stood without a peer.
There are many things in which Min
neSota takes rank in the first class; TWO
or three i'll which she is unapproach-
able; one-only one--where she stands
nonpareil among her sister states. To
enumerate and gloat over some of her
superior advantages: Where can be found
climate more repiete with the ozone of
health? Are the skies of sunny Italy
more blue? And are not our pei
lucid lakes fit mirrors for this ceru-
lean dome? Other states and ma
tons have beautiful women. but
none can surpass the Medicean forms
the splendid complications. or the
brightness OF the enslaving eyes of our
Minnesota sisters. Sweethearts and
wives. Their magnetic orbs have stolen
the seductive blue from the liquid
depths of our most beautiful lakes;
their laughter has plundered our fairy
waterfalls of their ripping melody;
their arms and Threats have fiIched
whiteness and purity from the piled
snow drifts heaped into ivory mountains
before the sturdy breath of the biz.
zard
But this subject must not be fingered
over, because 1t is pregnant with too
great possibilities for poetry and elo-
quence. Let us drop the ideal for the
actual. We are nearly first among the
Understanding states of the Union, and
if we did not invent No. l hard, we did
construct the mills that gave value to
it. We have recently discovered the
most valuable iron ore on the continent,
and are now sending it forth to fatten
and enrich the hard and hungry ores of
Pittsburg and Birmingham. Our maple
syrup, garnered from the sap by Chip
pewa squaw power, now enters into the
markets of the country in full COMPETE
ton with the pertumed sweets of old
Vermont, and adds marketable flavor
to the rugged and acrid juices of the
sorghum of Kansas and Nebraska. We
are improving all the breeds of all the
domestic animals -including man-and
showing in thousand ways the SUI
preme ruership that mind exercises
over matter.
In all intellectual pursuts-save one
Minnesota stands the equal of any in
the sisterhOod. As yet we have
produced no home poet worthy
to sing the surprising loneliness of
L'Etoile du Nord In lieu of that.
however, we have originated an
unexampled use-annihiIator in the
mental building of Mr.. Donnelly. Ger
tainly others before our great citizen
had yentured out on the vast ocean of
speculation-Some of them leaving on t
of sight the guiding Pillars of Hercules.
even, in searching for some intellectual
continent great enough and sublime
enough to bear the strain of supporting
those marvellous works which the mere
vulgar are wont to attribute to fourth
rate actor and Bohemian named Will
lam Shakespeare. But, thank Provi-
dence, no one before him had conceived
the theoIy Of the cipher. To this great
mind was first whispered the darling
prophecy of an interlinksd story
hidden away In the plays and
poems of the Master. More than
book to prove the existence of the
cryptOgram. To be more technically
exact, 1t would be better to assert,
possibly, that he wrote large volume
| to say that he had found the secret of
| the cipher, and proposed some time in
| the indefinite future to sell that secret to
| the world III another volume
| But, anyhow, Mr.. Donnelly was the
discoverer of the subtle strand of moon
shine which runs. or might. would,
could or should run. irreguIarly through
the works of the great poet. He is en-
Titled by the unquestioned right of dis
| covery to this equivocally woven cob
web; and, if fiim-ham were patentable,
would be entitled 10 retain and possess
! forever all the honors and emoluments
attaching thereto. But no great dis
coverer was ever permitted to reap the
! full harvest of his labOrS and sacrifices.
Kings and priests were unjust toward
| Columbus. Why should our great citl-
zen hope to escape tie common fate of
genius?
A man named Owen-Orville w.
| Owen-whO lives in the more common
| place commonwealth of Michigan-has
! started out to reap the crop of laurel
| sown by Mr.. Donneily. The GLOBE
can do nothing more than enter its SOL
| emn protest. This man Owen, taking
| the hint from our own great discoverer,
| proceeds to proclaim an entirely new
and different cipher-a perfectly orig
inal strand of moonshiue-decorating
| and adjoining the works of Shakespeare.
His eryptogram is even more startling
than that of Mr.. Donnelly. 1t is also
| based upon foundation entirely for
| eign to that so firmly laid and SO
compactly cemented by our cele-
brated compatriot. Owens cipher has
for its basis only -four pregnant
words, viz: Fortune, Honor, Nature
and Reputation. Three of these words,
! probably. Mr.. Owen is seeking by max.
! ing public announcement of his find.
just why lie injected Nature into the
quartette of symbolical words is not
| clear But this cipher goes on to relate
the marvellous story that Lord Bacon
| (no cipheriSt seems to be able to un-
hitch his clutch from this queer old law
yer) was the son of Queen Elizabeth
and the Earl of Leicester by secret
marriage, and that Bacon was therefore,
| by divine right, the king of England!
The VIII ole story is too long to be re-
lated here. Owen will tell it OH the
lecture platform, and probably in Ga
book. 1t is sufficient for the GLOBE to
enter its protest here against mere
Michigan man stealing aud profiting by
discovery which occupied so many
| years of the time of our distinguished
fellow citizen to invent. MIR. Owen
| should have been more original in his
| filching. Like Falstaff's charge against
! Bardolph, "he keeps not time" in his
| plunderlug. With as much justice. he