Evening times-Republican. [volume] (Marshalltown, Iowa) 1890-1923, 1902-12-03
unnu -s,epl6a Observation-Disclosures gnedag aeener 3 1902

listers that he had "a trout stream
| just around the corner and could shoot
bears from his window, and that was
much better than life in a Harlem fiat"
sss
The Octopus scored a tremendous
success both in the west and east, and
was regarded by the critics as work
of undoubled genius. The central mo-
| tive of the book is the Titanic struggle
waged between the Southern Pacific
railroad and the wheat farmer of Cal
| ifornia.
The Octopus is the great Pacific and
| Southwestern railroad'-a thin dis
guise for the Southern Pacific
which with unbounded rapacity, sucks
the life blood of California to increase
| its net earnings, and finally leaves its
| Victims tho rancehers and their fami-
| lies,-after their heroic struggle, dead
or sunk in hopeless misery. 1t is higher
than all authority. 1t owns the courts,
| the officials, the railroad commissioners.
1t works it's will remorselessly, ap-
propriates all the profits in every in
dustry .evicts the ranchers from their
homes, and slaughters them by Judicial
decree. AT the end, the Southern Pa
cific remains alone, triumphant, I'M
personal, pitted only against that other
! living force, the wheat.
The story is Intensely real. Both in
conception and execution of his theme,
this first volume stamps its author with
power, insight and creative genius of
the highest order The author shows
only the life of a great industry in the
unscrupulous grasp of capital, but in
cidentally, he shows something more
he does that which one of his charac-
ters fails to do. There is in the story, a
poet, Presley, who desires to write an
"heroic terrible" poem Of the west,
which should include all the life of the
people, their fightings, their loves and
their lusts, their blunt, grim humor,
their stoicism under stress, their adj
ventures, their treasures found in day
and gambled in night, their direct,
crude speech, their generosity and
cruelty, their heroism and bestiality.
their religion and profanity. their self
sacrifice and obscenity." The poem was
never written by Presley. but the poets
dream is transformed by the author
into reality worthy to be called an
epic. 1t is a story of men and OF
mighty forces battling for existence.
While come of the conclusions of the
work have been controverted, it is said
that the late Coils p. Huntington was
personal authority for much of it, and
that while resident in New York, he
aided greatly in simplifying the prob
lens which the book propounds.
1t is said that Portia, the daughter of
Booker T. Washington, failed (?) to
pass her examination for her second
year at Wellesley College. The explain
alton given out by the Wellesley fac
ulty, is that she was not proficient in
music" But people will understand
perfectly well why this young negro
woman has been denied the educational
advantages of this northern woman's
college. We had expected things of
Wellesley. and believe she has hurt her
own reputation more than that of the
young colored woman.
"Elizabeth''-she of German garden
fame, isn't coming to America, after all. |
1t seems that husband of hers-"The !
Man of Wrath" isn't what he's cracked
up to be in her books. We had sup
posed that a woman with EliGabeth's
Ideals had married a piece of perfection.
but it appears he is only common clay
after all. He has grown Jealous OF his
wifes fame and declines to come to
America, known only as 1.-THE husband
of Elizabeth" And say, he's just like
some American husbands-isn't he?