Freeland tribune. (Freeland, Pa.) 1888-1921, 1895-09-26
USURI0US DESPOTISM.
Shylock Me thods Employed by
Berlin Money Lenders.
Thousands of Prussians Driven to Ruin
or Exile Every Year-Marry-
ing for Money the
Sole Remedy.


Sole Remedy.
All Berlin sighs under the despotism
of-usury. The government, or at
least the pillars of the government,
sigh and suffer the most. For the past
six months one huge trial for usury has
followed another, and the end is not
yet. In one of these trials last fall,
says the San Francisco Argonaut, there
were no less than one hundred and
twenty-seven defendants, and the num-
Der of witnesses amounted to nearly
four hundred. A number of the worst
usurers have been found guilty and
sentenced to terms of imprisonment
ranging from six months upward to
seven years, besides heavy fines in
money. Quite number of the shrewd.
est and most dangerous had to be ac.
quilted for lack of proof. The young
capital of the new German empire will
remain the most usury-ridden city in
the world, where the vampireism of
legion of Shylocks steadily sucks the
life-blood of the higher as well as lower
classes, and drives annually hundreds
and thousands into ruin or into exile.
The cause is expressed by the un.
translatablc word 'standerstruecksich
ten," by which is meant the thou.
sand and one considerations which
Germans deem due to their rank or
station in life. Prussia is poor coun-
try, even to-day, after amalgamating
into its domain large districts of more
fertile and wealthier regions, such as
over and by the Rhine. The Prussian
nobility is the poorest of any civilized
country, with the single exception of
Italian. But the Prussian nobility,
nevertheless, is as proud as the
Spanish, vastly prouder than the British.
Their poverty now and their claims to
consideration, their station in life,
their prominent position in the state
lead to never-ceasing conflict. Their
peculiar code of honor forbids them to
engage in money-making pursuits,
least of all in trade or commerce, and
nothing is left them to live in accord
ance with the cast-iron notions of their
mind but either to enter the army as
professional soldiers, to enter the gov
erment employ, or else to till the mea-
ger paternal acres.
The latter occupation-which used to
furnish to brothers, cousins and sons of
such agricultural noblemen the secret
wherewithal TO live standesgesmaes ii.
G., according to their ranl1) in Berlin OF
elsewhere-is becoming less and less
profitable, owing to cheap American
and East Indian wheat, cheap Russian
rye, and cheap Australian meat. And
the pay of Prussian army officers or
government employees is still so wholly
inadequate that it does not suffice even
the most modest expectations up to the
age of forty or SO.
A 'money marriage" is the sole rem
edy left them to adjust their affairs
under normal conditions; but money
marriages. too, are becoming less and
less frequent, since the number of
claimants to each wealthy girls hand
is yearly becoming larger. The hunt
for an American heiress or for some
other exotic goldfish" is hence men
toned in the lexicon of these unen-
viable young men as the dernier
resort. This IA pid pen picture of the
actual conditions confronting nine
tenths of the young Prussian mobiles on
entering life is by no means complete.
But it will serve to show why the
usurer in Berlin has become power
of the first magnitude.
Each year scores of cases occur in
Berlin of young hopefuls ending their
brief butterfly existence by a we'll
directed bullet; of despairing fathers
quitting the service of that state to