The representative. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1893-1901, 1897-07-14

One pair of pants ............37 hours
One IeWou 49,. .............2 hOur
One pair woman's shoes, best .52118 hours
One pound OF crackers ..21a hours
One pound of coffee .........7 hours
One gallon coal oil ..........6k hours
One straw hat ................15 hours
One pair best shoes ...........70 hours
One quart Of peanuts ...........1 hour
One yard of gingham .........2 hours
One gallon gasoline ...........6 6 hours
Smith and his family soon get accus-
toned to the system of finance and
their life in the colony is under way.
There is a kindergarten for the small
children, taught by one of the
wives of the settlement. The next
grade Of pupils meet in schoolhouse
fitted as properly as any metropolitan
school. There is a professor of music,
who divides his time between violin les
sons and instructor in modern Ian
guages. Smith divides his children
among these departments and then re-
ports for work. He is assigned labor in
the gang which needs him most. He
works at his trade in case there is need
for him there, or elsewhere as the pres
ident may determine. He has no task
master, is told to do as much as he
thinks he could conscientiously call a
fair days labor. There is rarely a dis
position to shirk, three men who tried
to shirk having been suspended from
the settlement for year.
1t is not possible for the association
to adopt the eight-hour day at present
President Dodson hopes within a year,
after the pioneering days are over, that
the working day shall be reduced to
eight hours, with half holiday on
Saturday. There is no complaint over
hours, it having frequently happened
that men have put in forty hours week
extra time that the property which they
have been making for themselves might
be improved. The discomfort seems to
be confined to three families suspended
ity. They linger on the possessions of
the society, trying to get the Ruskin
colony into court for the appointment
of a receiver. The loyal members sneer
at the suit. They hurried to the county
seat to file the facts of their corporation
with the court as their evidence that
the colony is not only solvent and pros
porous, but paying it's bills on sight.
There being absolute financial equal
ity, there is no chance for social exclu-
siveness. All the children-and there
is host of them-run together, and the
men rest, read and work together. They
meet weekly in the theater-a great
room with plain boards on the inside
and the outside. They call the pro-
gram a symposium. The topics would
not disgrace university quadrangle.
about 1000 books. The books are
books of distractions and theories along
the line of the original philosophy of
Utopia. 1t is only in hearing the men
lelAh IAeIC CuC WOlh Ill 1uculdI uoNclOD-
ment is shown. The progress in music
during the two successful years is
demonstrated in the inventory of the
musical instruments of this town in
the Wilderness The property schedule
shows five pianos, seven organs, nine
violins, five guitars, one bass viol. one
banjo, three cornets, two flutes, one fife,
one piccolo and one tuba. This is the
role of Ruskin socialistic orchestra
The music school earns its principal
eighty hours a week.
TEACHES THE FINE ARTS.
Prof. Broome, who was good enough
when he lived in New York city to be
sent as commissioner to the Paris ex-
position, is now teaching the youngsters
OF his Utopia the fine arts. He wears
an old hat and jeans, which he buys
over the community counter with the
hour checks which his pupils bring to
him. He has classes in drawing water
coloring and the beginnings of sculp-
ture. His plans embrace the establish
ment of pottery, since in one of his
creeping excursions into the caves in the
cliffs he found mud bank which he
thinks supplies the best pottery material
in the country. The pottery people will
tell you that BrOome knows clay when
he sees 1t. The walls of the cottages
and his shop are decorated with anna
teur art that ranks with the products
of the average school for art among
youngsters.
This is the art, musical, financial So
cial and intellectual side of Ruskin. It
has no religious life-much to the hor-
ror of the natives. who are invariably
enthusiasts in Methodism. Ruskin has
no church. It will never have any. The
Ruskin colony thinks that church
would kill the scheme. The members
claim that it would not be possible to
establish a commonwealth of equality
and socialism among people divided ON
theology. They do not prohibit wor-
ship, allowing the churchmen who are
there to be churchmen in their homes
or to drive to one Of the native churches.
There are seven or eight who do this.