The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1902-11-13
positions even higher than that in the public est
nation.

AQme-a second gentleman of importance on the
forearm with the point of sword and the sanguine
affair was declared ended by the seconds. More
than the usual amount of opera boufe properties
heightened the gayety of the engagement and the
hundred or more spectators wended their homeward
way with their cameras tucked under their arms
feeling eminently satisfied with the quality and
quantity of the entertainment that had been pro-
vided for them
To an American or an Englishman the French
duel seems the height of absurdty but when looked
at from broad viewpoint it appears to have good
deal to recommend it. One thing can be said in its
favor that it is usually quite harmless and is often
more satisfactory way of settling dispute than by
going to law. It at least leaves no rancor in the
bosoms of the disputants-a reconciliation on the
field is much part of the game as coffee and
cigarettes, those who appeal to the courts to
settle their differences frequently hate each other
as long as they live A scar left by physical en-
counter is, in most instances, not to be compared
with that left by the cut of cruel speech action
and it is fact that when men who have quarreled
are enabled to get together at and shave it OUT
with the gloves, after some such fashion as the
French pursue, they seldom harbor hard feelings
against another afterward On the contrary they
are often better friends than before the encounter
each having learned to respect the skill and prowess
of the other To advocate such methods of settling
disputes would shock the sensibiities of some, but
most men in their hearts will admit that in some
cases they would prove satisfactory. Because they
are mercurial, it has become the fashion in this
country to speak of the French people as only a
degree removed from idiots very young children,
but the truth is that they among the most pro-
gressive nations on the globe And their institu-
tions are admirably adapted to their temperament
Among Americans the dainty duello of the Partisan
would be ridiculous in the extreme; among French
men it has it's sphere of usefulness.
THE most picturesque parsonage before the
public eye since the retirement Of DeWet from the
strenuous life is Karl Inger the mysterious ally of
the Mad Mullah in Somaliland. This man, whose
life has been a continuous round Of intrigue in
volving the destiny of nations, and of fighting in
desperate causes in out-of-the way of the
globe, is the dominant figure on the British horizon
at present. He it was that drilled the troops Of
Somaliland until they can maneuver as we'll as
Europeans and can chivey an English army across
the desert at fifty mile clip, and he it is who has
the power to say whether not the Mad Mullah
shall make war on the British in earnest. He is
shifty person, this niger One day we hear of him
fighting in hand-to-h hand battle and the next he
appears hundreds of miles away debating letters and
laying down conditions He has all the nonchalance
of q creation of Ouida's and all the bravado of
hero of Dumas. He strangely out of place
in the prosaic twentieth century.
Little is known regarding the antecedents of
Karl Inger. Report has it that he was at time
an officer in the Austrian army and that he was
relieved of his commission because of some shady
transaction at the gaming tables. However this may
be- it is known that in 1896 he was arrested by the
Turkish authorities at Suakin, the west coast of
Africa, charged with being incendary character
He was clad in the costume of dervish, and when
he searched his voluminous garments assayed
quantity of drill books with the manual of and
tactics done into Arabic He got out of that scrape
somehow and when next heard of he had been con-
verified to Mohammedism by the Mad Mullah and by
that gentleman baptized. He now bears the Gu
phonious cognomen of Emin Suleyman-an ap-
pellaton redolent Of Arab, Hebrew and Hibernian
"reminiscences.
It is romantic picture he presents to the
minds eye, seated in state surrounded by his dusky
servitors dealing out trouble and debating terms to
the British Empire. It is picture that recalls
in way Give and Cecil Rhodes. But unfor-
tunately the end which can be almost certainly
predicted is not romantic It savors of bowstrings
or, still, blinded eyes and row of redcoats
Adventure on the scale pursued by Inger does not
prosper in this age. When the adventurer is ap-
parently most successful his career ia most ikev To