The Ketchum keystone. [volume] (Ketchum, Idaho) 1885-1899, 1895-08-31
USURIOUS DESPOTISM.
shylock Methods Employed by
Berlin Money Lenders
Thousands o1 Prussaans DfavoA - Doin
or Exile Every Yeer-Mazsy-
Ing Tor Money the
Sole Remedy.

or Ex0o Every x0o1@M03Jy
Ing Tor Money the
Sole Remedy.
All Berlin sighs under the despotism
of-usury. The government, or q
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 moi
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 mum
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 te
seven years, besides heavy fines in
money Quite number Of the shrewd
est and most dangerous had to be &C
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 q
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.
translatable word ''standerstrueclsich.
ten," by which is meant the thou
sand and one considerations which
Germans deem due to their rank OF
station in life. Prussia is poor coun'
try, even to-day, after amalgamating
into it's domain large districts OF more
fertile and wealthier regions, such as
Nassau, Hesse-C -Cassel, districts in Han
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 neves-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
to live standesgesmaes Il.
e., according to their rank) in Berlin or
becoming less and less
owing to cheap American
and East Indian wheat, cheap Russian
~ e, and cheap Australian meat. And
the pay of Prussian army officers or
employees is still so wholly
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
/" 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 hciress or for some
other exotic goldfish" is hence men
Toned in the lexicon of these unen-
viable young men as the dernier
This rapid 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
nsurer 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 we'll
directed bullet; of despairing fathers
quitting the service of that state to
which they had devoted the best years
IF their life at personal and financial
sacrifice; of middle-aged men disappear
ng land often turning up again in
miserable guise in some transatlantic
from their old-time haunts,
md all this because the usurer at last
aas drawn the net close about them.
And the number of poor, dowerless
1irls, of sisters and brides OF these
,ame young men, girls who Of their
,wn free choice abandon every hope
# wifehood and motherhood simply to
enable their lords of the other sex,
heir brothers in most cases, to cut
igure for q time, to live standesge-
naes, is fairly innumerable. These
,oor girls, silent, accomplishing VIC
inns of hoary prejudice, are the real
,eroines in these tragedies OF life.
That is why Berlin is honeycombed
With usury, and that il why usury IL
'egular proSession-or, rather, . fine
Lrt.