New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1896-07-27
MIR. BRYAN EXPOSED.

Mr. Bryan ought to set up an escutcheon, tax
Ing as emblematic the ostrich which hid Its
head in the sand and imagined its body was
concealed. Is the man actually so dull as not TO
see that the wild rush Of Populists and An
archists to his support tells the whole story!
There is not a ranting fanatic in the country,
nor mad breaker Of all laws, human or d.
vine who Is not to-day willing to vote for
Bryan. How does all this come to pass! is 1t
because these people know nothing about him
He has spent some years as the agent, 1t may
be charitaby assumed as the salared agent, OF
the silver millionaires in stumpng Western
and Southern States, and the craZiest cranks In
all that region are for Bryan. Does 1t make
any difference to anybody whether he accepts
q Populist nomination or declines 1t?
One may assume that he will decline, or do
something which he imagines equivalent to a
declnation Where is the use? The trouble Is
that though he is willing to promise anything
to anybody, or to refuse anything which would
not pay, n convention Of the most brainless and
passionate creatures on this planet have joyfully
chosen him, in the words Of one Of them, las
their Noses" When folks get into that state Of
mind about man, they think his ideas are
their own They have heard him talk, IN multi
tudes Of speeches which have not been report
ed. fortunately for Mr. Bryan. They know
what his underlying temper is. and they get
great deal more enthusiastic about the man
than they do about any statement of their own
opinion that they are able to frame.
This will not be the whole Of the fight this
year. Bryan would be a cheap thrd-class
ranter. hired by some faction Of his party at a
moderate figure per week. in another campaign.
This time he is candidate for the most exalted
office in the gift of seventy million Americans,
because some Of them think he means the same
revolutionary things which they mean. Pos
sibly he talks too much. some OF them say.
with a tone of apology, but he is against cor
porations-being at the time a hired attorney
for one of them. Perhaps he is a wordy dema-
gogue with no principles at all" say others,
probably without Justice At bottom the trouble
is that he mistakes his own defamation for
knowledge, and his own metaphors for convic-
tons.
The impressive feature of his nomination by
the Populist Convention Is that 1t gives better
and stronger testimony than any which Mr..
Bryan himself can possibly give that he is the
kind of man the fanatics and regulators want
above all others 1t will not do him a bit of good
to say that their platform is not his; they chose
him from all the world to represent and execute
that platform 1t would be a stupid waste or
time for the man to say that he is in form not a
Populist but a Democrat. The POpulists had
votes enough to pitch Sewall into the ocean
which washes the shores Of Maine. but the
same votes deliberately selected Bryan to be
their Moses The world will certainly take him
and them ut their word. He fished for An
archsts and regulators in his speech at Chi
cago and caught them. But the whole tribe OF
them stuck to him at St Louis, because they
really know him better than he probably knows
himself.