Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1897-04-22
The Finish.
AT HONE, April 10, 1897.

At Cincinnati we halted just long
enough to get breakfast and engage a
Pullman seat over the B. & o. South
| western to St. Louis. We took our
morning meal in the Union Station
! restaurant, and if the sausage hadn't
| been so much underdoue, l would
have had no cause for complaint. But
| to me, sausage in the morning repast,
when the glittering frost bedecks roof
and rock and tree, is the piece de resist
| ance, and like the lea7en of fraud in
law, its lightest fault vitiates the whole
layout.
To one accustomed to the huge di-
mensions, the varied accommodations,
and the sumptuous furnishings of the
| St. Louis Union Station, that at Gin
ciunati seems out of date and shabby
beyond repair. 1t could lose itself
| three times within the dimensions OF
the former, and bears the marks of a
decade long out of date. But the Of
! ficials are efficient and obliging, and
the annnoyances of the little complica-
| tions which always attend Il s'change
of cars" were reduced to the minimum.
At O'Clock we pulled out os the
station and started on our long run
/ across the Intervening States of In
diana and Illinois. The day was
bright and pleasant, and vegetation
was giving sign of returning life in re-
sponse to the increasing power of the
sun. The desolation of last years
dead meadows was relieved by fre-
quent patches of living green, and the
ploughmen were busy in the fields on
the plateaus. But when we reached
the lowlands of Indiana and Illinois,
the landscape was not diversified by
this evidence of industry. On the
contrary, acres upon acres were sub
merged beneath the waters that had
fallen and was lying inert upon the
dead level of the prairie. OF course
there were higher grounds, but their
wetness was still too great for work
ing except in the most favored situa-
tions After leaving Vincennes we
| found the Wabash overfowing its
banks, frequently making an inland
sea of itself. Comparisons are said to
be odious. but couldn't help mentally
contrasting favorably the mountain
wastes lying helplessly subjected to
the aqueous raids of every recurring
season. In the curious makeup of
this old earth it seems irrevacably set
down that no one portion thereof shall
possess all the favorable conditions,
nor that any other portion shall be
irretrivably bad. And as Mother
Earth is so constructed, how can bet
ter be logically expected of her prog
eny? To become angels, men and
women have to shake the dust of this
world from their souls: to become
uShllS, luCy thuoG IOi 0eAnO 1AAO 5OON'
there's in it.
In traversing the two States, we
passed many village, town and city,
but Prosperity's sign-board was not
visible to the average eye. On the
contrary an air of languor seemed to
cover them all, and we looked in vain
for the mills that Confidence was to
set a-running all over the land. Even
the fouring-mills seemed to be drowsi
ly humming in half-hearted, perfume
tory sort of way. Was that advance
agent" a gay deceiver and are his
promises all of the. Dead-Sea-apple
3 variety? l had. in the years gone by
a passing knowledge of Flora, a rail
: road town about midway across the
State of Illinois. 1t was then a lively
fiourishing place, with a good trade
busy artisans, and thrifty population
generally. Last week the haze of un
thrift seemed to have settled upon it
fair proportions; the old bank build
ing looked tired and worn-out; tn,
streets were deserted save for a siugl
vehicle called to receive and transpor
into the country a passenger from tn
train, and one weary looking man OF
a wheel. The louDgers on the rail
road platform moved listlessly about
and the meagre mail-bags were lazil.
handled by porter evidently disgust
ed with the perfunctoriness of his job
l refer to Flora, not as an exception
but as the rule which shows the de
cadence of that prosperity which re
fuses to be recalled by the artful woo
ings of Confidence entrenched behind
the glamour of the gold standard an
crowned with the laurels of Protection
Perhaps people some day will lear
that it is not we'll to entrust their well
being with the money-ehangers VIII
profit through their misfortune, no
vet to DIace the enactment of Law In tn