The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1897-02-25


tue RANKS of the Lords host and march
bes.venward. each one taking regi-
ment with him. The mountain of in
ebriacy is not an ordinary mountain;
but il is armed. 1t is a line of fOrtresses
continually blazing away its destruct-
i've forces upon all our nelghborhoOds, /
towns and cities, their volleys OF death !
poured down upon the homes and
churches. Under this power more
than 100, coo men and women in this
country are every year imprisoned,
and an army Of 6OO,O drunkards al
most shake the earth with their stag
gering tread. 1t causes in this coun-
try 800 murders and 400 suicides
year. This Mountain of lnebriacy has
rot only assaulted the land, but bonn
barded the shipping of the sea, ana
some of the most appalling shlpWrecks
on the Atlantic and Pacific coasts
have been the result. What sank
the steamer Rothsay Castle, on the
way from Liverpool to Dublin, de-
stroying 100 human lives? A drunken
cea captain. What blew up the Ben
Sherrod on the Mississippi and Sent
$50 to horrible death? A drunken
crew. What drove on the breakers
steamer making her way from New
York to Charleston, and sent whole
families, on the way home from sum
mer watering places, to the mercilcss
depths of the sea? A drunken sea
captain. Gather up from the depths
of the rivers, and lakes, and oceans
the bones Of those shiDwrecked by in
toxicated captains and crews. and you
could build out of them a temple of
horrors, all the pillars and affairs and
ceilings fashioned of human skulls.
1t is possible that such a Mountain Of
| Iuebriacv can ever be made a plain?
| Iorder. also, is the Mountain of
Crime, with its strata of fraud, and
malpractice, and malfeasance, and
blackmail, and burglary, and piracy,
and embezzlement, and ibertlnlsm,
| and theft, all its height manned with
| the desperadoes, the cutthrOats. the
pickpoclets, the thin ble-riggcrs, the
plunderers, the marauders, the pill
layers, the corsairs, the wreckerS, the
bandits, the tricksters, the forgers,
the thugs, the garotters, the fire tiends,
the dynamiters, the shoplifters, the
l1leptomaniacs, the pyromaniacs, the
dipsomaniacs the smugglers, the kid
napers, the Jack Shepparls, the Rob
ert Macaires, and the Macbeths of
villainy. Tho crimes of the
world! Am ! not right in
calling them, when piled up togeth-
er, mountain? But we can not
bring ourselves to appreciate great
heights except by comparison. You
think of Mount Washington as high,
especially those of you who assembled
as of old, on mule back, or more re-
Gently by railtran, to the Tip Top
House. Oh, no! That is not high! For
it is only about 5000 feet, whereas ris-
ing on tins Western Hemisphere are
Chimborazo, y ZOO feet high, and
Mount Sahama. $4,000 feet high, and
Mount Sarota, "a, 500 feet high. But
that is not the highest mountain on
the Western Hemisphere. The high
est mountain is the mountain OF crime
and is it possible that this mountain
before our Zcrubbabel, can never b'
= made a plain?
There is also the Mountain Of War
: the most volcanic of all mountains
the Nesuvius which, not content, like
the Vesuvius of Italy, with over
WIDENING two cities, Herculaneun
and Pompeii, has covered with it
y fcr7 scora thousands of cities, anC
, would like to whelm all the cities o
= both hemispheres. Give this noun
tain full utterance, and it would cove
up Washington and New York ant
: London as easily as a householder
) with his shovel, at ten o'clock a
d night, ia nks CRATE fire with ashes
II The mountain is pile Of fortresses
y barricades, and armorles, tn
y worlds artillery heaped wheel
! above wheels, cOlumbiads abov
1 coIumbiads, 14-pouuders above =
: Founders, wrecked nations abov
wrecked nations. This Mountain {
War is not only loaded to cannonad
Il the earth, but it is also a cemetery
8 holding the corpses Of 10000, 900 slai
in the wars of Alexander and Cyru:
< 60, 900, 900 slain i'll Roman wars, $50, 0C
&c slain in war with Turks and Saracen
> and holding about $4,000, 600, CT
IA corpses, not million. but billion
IL which was the estimate made by Ee
10 -, mund Burke more than hundre
years ago of those who had been d.
3 stroyed by wars, SO that you woul
~ ~, have to add many more millions nov
The mightiest, grandest movemer
10 for driving brutal war out of the cart
," dates from January II, 1897. The me
IA who on either side of the sea did mo
~ to effect that plan of arbitration ha,
~ made themselves immortal. The eve
;" ing of the present administration
- the United States government HI
'' been honorcd with the gladde
AZ event of the Is centuries.
~ civilized nations will copy Il
~ sublime example. | impore Il
- illustrious senate of the I'm
~ ed States to allow nothing to interfe
&c with vote of rat ification, that t
* bells of all Christendom may ring OF
10 Peace on earth, good will iowa
men," Senators, many of you my pc
A I, sonal friends, let me say that this
: the opportunity of your lives. BY Ell