The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1903-09-02
ESPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE.

ESPECIAL oRREsPoNDENCE.
The daily press is giving start
ling number of instances of defalca-
ton, insanity and suicide by men
whose positions allow them to han
die other peoples money; and the
twin cities are furnishing their
quota. The cause is not difficult to
discover. Affairs in the business
and social world are running at too
high pressure. Everyone is scram-
bling for a fortune. and all want to
get it on the mushroom plan. Every
one is bound to keep up appear
ances with his neighbors, regard
less of circumstances, and he will
ingly takes chances at once desper-
ate and dangerous to enable him to
do so. In order to save time and
effort we use food already cooked,
masticated and partially digested
by machinery. and cram it down
our threats on the run. We catch
little snatches of sleep at times
when the brain is too tired to evolve
more schemes to make an additional
dollar, and use thousand dollar au-
tomobiles, bought on the installment
plan, because horses and street cars
are too slow. The strain is too
great for human endurance, and the
tragedies we read of every day are
the direct and legitimate result.
The Germans, who are the most
conservative as we'll us the most OBJ
serving people on earth, are entire
ly right in saying that the Ameri-
can people are money mad.
This is not saying that money is
not good thing to have, or that
there is anything wrong in the ac-
dOlSltlOu VI IL. DuU We SuOulQ uOG
make physical wrecks or maniacs of
ourselves in the endeavOr to be-
come millionaireS, or to accumulate
fortunes in fortnight. John D.
Rockefeller, who is perhaps more
times a millionaire than any other
man in America, or perhaps, in the
world, would doubtless give mil
lion dollars if he could eat three
good meals a day and have a good
nights sleep just for one week.
Then there is another phase of
the situation which is worthy of
consideration. We are told that we
are in the midst of good times. This
is true. No man who wants a Job is
without one, and money was never
more plentiful. But while this is
all true it is also true that the ten
sion of the business world is about
as tight as it will stand. Things
have reached condition which
they nearly always assume just be-
fore smash-up. We cannot go on
forever paying masons a bonus to
work for US at seventy-five cents an
hour when no other country pays
more than half as much; we are not
always going to pay wages to plumb
ers which will allow them to retire
and live life of luxurious ease after
five years S work, and we are not
always going to pay twenty-five
cents pound for beefsteak which
was sold to the retailers at eight
cents. There's day of wholesale
adjustment coming and Someone S
going to get squeezed. And this is
not a pulling, pessimistic plant, but
a purely philosophic prophesy,
The picture of Cole Younger
which appears on the placards ad-
vertising his book, makes him look
Older. Still everyone knows he's
Younger.
On the race track of the state fair
grounds was recently given an in
teresting exhibition of automobile
speed. 1t was really an automobile
race, the machines being divided
into classes, according to their ca
pacity, just as race horses are, and