The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1899-05-23
GEN. FREpER1cK FuNsroN.


age a boy is brave just so long as he
| holds to the traditions of savagery.
J When he begins to regard his raiment
| and to fear dirt, when he begins to take
account of personal cOmfOrt-which al
| though ''ScOrned of DEVILS is cherished
in polite society-the boy begins to lose
his valor and becomes a well-regula-
ted member of society, with an amDl-
ton to sit at a desk and to avoid doing
anything unusual Now the key to the
character of Frederick Funston, re-
Gently appointed brigadier general of
volunteers for gallant conduct, is the
fact that in the SO years of his roman
tic, adventurous, and eventful life he
has never passed a period when ne
thought the second time about the dirt
on his clothes. He wandered into the
fringe of civilization in the years of his
adolescence, and all his life 1t has been
of more Importance to him to accomp-
lish his ends than it has been to keep
his cuffs clean. Many heroic deed IN
this world has been left undone be-
cause it would soil a shirt; but with
Funston the deed, not the shirt, mas
been of primary Importance, as it is
with every boy. Funston is still boy
"a deVil-may-care, earnest, honest,
patriotic boy, who will not be Impress
ed with his gold braid and his star TOO
deeply. He has lived all his life out-of-
doors, in lands of danger and amid
alarms. The visions that boys see have
come true in Funston's daily life, ana
he has never awakened from his dream
to find his feet chained to a desk, ana
his mind the slave of a column OF cap
ricious figures which will not obey the
reasonable requirements or a balance
His mind has grown with experience
and with the culture that comes from
wide reading. He has the keen lnteIll-
gence of a scholar and gentIenan'ahd
writes as well as he fights, having con-
tributed to Harper'S Weekly and TO
Scribner's Magazine and to St Men
olas But his body is boys body,
that does not ShiVer nor falter at hard
a
They see eXpedients which reason ana
sage logic would boot at. 1t was BOY
who swan the Bagbag; boy Who
charged the Filipinos from a ra1t For
a man would have thought or fever
germs and rheumatism,and would have
been a cautious colonel. But the BOY
shoulder, and the boy in the heart of
all the world rouses to throw up ITS
hat at these splendid achievements
Now the foregoing remarks, being
written by way of introduction, may be
thrown cut as irrelevant incompetent,
immaterial and not the best evidence
Yet to comprehend the facts OF run
ston's career some explanatory WORDS
seem necessary.
When the Twentieth regiment of
Kansas volunteers encamped near san
Francisco last summer the regiment
was a sorry looking lot. The young
men had left their homes in Kansas for
Topeka, where they were mustered
into service, wearing not their every
day clothes, but their old worn out
clothes They supposed that the state
of Kansas would equip them with uni
forms Immediately, and when the state
did not do so, but hustled the boys into
overland trains. rag, tag, and bobtail,
the reporters for the Pacific coast pa
pers jeered the Kansas boys with Jeers
Highly humorous episodes illustrating
the ignorance of the KansanS We're
printed for the delectation of Califor-
mans. and Laughter. holding both his
sides. walked up and down in front or
the Kansas regiment every morning and
evening. All of which simply proves
that beauty is only skin deep. For the
fact according to the report of the mus
tering officer, is that the twentieth
Kansas instead of being ignorant, did
not contain a man who could not read
and write: twO-thirds of its commits
stoned officers held degrees from west
ern colleges and universities. Its lieu
tenant colonel once represented the
United States as consul general at caro-
and his name is honOred upon the dedi-
cation page of Mr.. Richard Harding
Davis THE Rulers of the Mediterran-
can; the regimental majors are men of
expert military education and excep-
tionaI culture; the regimentaI colonel,
Frederick Funston, is type of Anglo
Saxon fighter, as the fighter is found
in the history which glOrifeS John
Smith and Miles StandiSh, Joe Hooker
and Roosevelt.
Funston left the Kansas farm in his
teens. where his fathers household was
he picked up Spanish. He entered the
Kansas State university in his early
twenties, alternating annually the pur-
suit of knowledge with the pursuit of
dolIars-first as a Santa Fe train col
lector, then as a Kansas City news
paper reporter, and later as a govern
ment botanical explorer in the Da-
kotas and Montana, and finally IN the
terrible Death valley of southern Cali
fornia.
Funston is the only member of the
government surveying party which
went into Death valley in 1891 who is
now alive and sane.
In 1892 Funston left school, and the
government sent him to Alaska to
made his second and last trip to Alaska.
He went down the Yukon and up the
Porcupine river, spending most of the
winter at Rampant House, under the
Arctic circle. During the winter the
Indians brought a rumor that whaling
fleet had been crushed to pieces in the
ice of the Arctic ocean. Boyish curiOs-
ity sent Funston with an Indian guide
from Rampant House to the place
where the wrecked fleet was supposed
to be. He and the guide lost their way.
and went 900 miles on snow shoes in
the night of an arctic winter. But when
he found the North American whaling
fleet locked in the ice and in good con-
ditiOn, the boys interest in the matter
was satisfied, and he went back to
Rampant House. Alone, in an open
canoe. without companion or guide, he
went down the POrcupine to the Yukon
and on the Yukon to Boring sea, a dis
lance of something like 1900 miles.
Ostensibly he was surveying the flora
of the river banks, but really he was
quenching a boys thirst for adventure.
After FunstOns return from Alaska in
1894 fate almost caught and Gagged him
Six months trying to establish a coffee
plantation in Central America, and a
year as assistant auditor of the Santa
Fee were too tame for him, and he es-
capped to Cuba on the Dauntless. To
casual acquaintance he said he was
go to Cuba to fight, beca use he believed
Cuba had just cause and needed help