The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1900-01-23
SOME LONDON SWAGGER.

Well-informed people will not have
forgotten hat during our brief cam
paign of 1898 the London newspapers,
especially the Tfmes-the ~so-called
Thunderer-Were mighty free with dis
paraging comments on our government,
its Onduc of affairs, its grasp Of the
situation, etc. We recall quite wildly
the air of superiority with which these
military critics deplored American
shortcomings, and the all too eager
alacrity of their commiseration with
us in our m~isfortunes. Whether they
were enlisted in the homemade con-
spiracy to malign the war department.
and blacken the character Of Secretary
Alger, or were merely exploiting the
.-fatuity and conceit which have made
Great Britain so admired and beloved
throughout the world, we do NOT pre-
tend to know. Nor, indeed, is the
question n of great Importance. The
fact remains, and current events seem
to invite attention to it.
It will be remembered, no doubt, that
in April, 1898, the United States had
an army of exactly %, 200 men. 1t will
be admitted, we think, that between
April and July of that year we raised,
armed, and equipped 275, 900 men, landed
expeditions in Cuba and Porto Rico,
and changed the map of two hemis-
pheres. BY the first of August it was
over. We lost 1000 men from all causes
acquired territory five times as extern
sive az the Orange and Transvaal re-
publics put together, and resumed our
ordinary, everyday avOcatiOnS without
the smallest parade or braggadocio,
excepting the loud noise of a handful
OF newspaper heroes who are not worth
mentioning here. We encountered no
checks, sustained no reverses, and, best
O< oil Is---no@l @r,--n1r-A- 49, ,-1
gar boaSt and ~oStentation. The London
papers, especially the Times, which
has for its American correspondent an
eXpatriated Yankee Mugwump, indulg-
ed themselves in all sorts of malicious
comment n beefy raillery, but our
war department went straight along
upon Its way, n within five months
closed an incident of infinitely more i'm
portance than that in which England
is noW-thus far Observation-Disclosures
ed.
1t occurs to us that if some one, with
large leisure and a taste for punctur-
ing humbugS, should care Ito contrast
the impudent Swagger of the London
newspapers during the summer of 1898
with their abject, almost maudlin cat
erwauling now, he would have a rich
and lush and fallow field to work in.
Fol our part, we have no taste for such
employment. The SPECTACLE Of these
simple, honest, gallant English gentle.
men sacrificed TO the Sordid wicked
ness of the Rhodes-Chamberlain COM
pact of piracy and the imbecile leader
ship of conceited braggarts distresses
us as deeply as it can the victims and
the mourners of the tragedy at home.
We could easily 1ampoon the swagger-
ing ignorance Of Butler and Gatacre and
others of whom the Beers have made
hlImiliafinp exhibitions. Their Stuni3
boasts of eating Christmas dinilers in
Pretoria; their still more STUPID dis
paragement Of the boorish and tenight-
ed Dutch-this would furnish mex
haustible material for merriment. We
let it pass, however. We do not forget,
of ourse On the contrary, we remem-
ber.-WaShington Post.