The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-08-14
The News and Oh.
server.
Continued from Page ,Five.)

Continued from Page .F'ive.)
buckshot, distance, five paces!-and
Christian ducked his head and attack
ed pad of paper while the second
stood by in vain expostulation at the
parbarity of the terms proposed.
| shall always be glad to have known
| the man in some degree intimately. No
one could do that and fail to feel the
| Dig heart of him, to get an impulse
| towards independent thinking, and
| new IDEAS With all his wit. his novel
| ", ms unusualness, he differed from
the run or erratic men of brains in
| that he was, sometimes, painfully
modest. L remember a good illustra-
ton of this quality which came at
! time when regularly on an afternoon
| paper, was likewise doing cub report
ling for The News and Observer
| Christian had just returned from Will
| mington and was engrossed in the
| writing of a long account of "a crazy
| man, who had been formerly promin-
ent in the State, who had escaped
from the asylum and was being
| brought back on the train by which he
had himself arrived.
Characteristically artistic, he had
elected to write the story from the
point of view of the crazy man, and,
las | entered the office, he was deep in
the work. Neither of us spoke word,
but after a While Christian began to
pass me the sheets, which a devil
nad been carrying to the composing
room as fast as they were written.
! knowing nothing of the theme of the
article, l thought at first it was the
writer who was crazy, but as / caught
the dflft L read ii like a novel On
ana on went the story here some
green boyhood scene, there the count
ing room OF bank, yonder a great
snip ploughing it's way through the
ocean, then scene of home and wife
and children-and ever and anon the
bald brick walls of the asylum and
the grated windows of a cell
Suddenly the writer jumped from
r his chair and started from the room.
l He groaned with n real agony: Good
Lord!' he said, I'm ruined, ruined"
and he rushed away with the proof
of the finest story the paper had pos
sibly ever contained yet unread.
: And the next day l found him at
the Marlborough afraid to look at the
paper, ashamed to meet the eye Of an
acquaintance!
q Another time, early in the morning,
snow on the ground, Christian found
: at the Erapps corner the PROSTATE
f body of drunken man. He called
r for assistance, got the unconscious
man to his room at the Marlborough,
bought two tickets to Greensboro, and
. by 10 o'clock the next morning had
s placed his charge in the Keeley In
stitute, had him inoculated with
a gold and was on his way back to
Raleigh.
The treatment took" and though
f the man ragged for While. he never
drank again, dying after eight years
) of useful and correct life a man who
f was honored and beloved by the State
at large.
With such a character and such a
theme it were easy for newspaper
man to ramble to the end both of all
his space and all the patience of his
readers, but may 1 be pardoned If ]
speak of Johnny Jenkins and myself
when we represented the awful ex-
ample of the Press in the clutches of
the money octopus?
Nearly all the State has heard the
joke of the prominent Raleigh lawyer
who in 1896 sought out one of the
original free silver advocates to sound
him in the matter of his attendance as
a delegate to the National Democratic
Convention of that year:
"Are you for free silver?" demand
ed the man approached.
We'll yes!" replied the lawyer
"but I'm no d--n fool about it,
Then you can't go! almost shout
ed the silver man, as he turned on his
heel.
This by way of saying that when
the charge of being associated with
| the money power was hurled at John
( ny Jenkins and myself by Populist
| f,fse FOR, f1n11 I
| guilty in that | wasn't a oh fool"
in that particular way-but Johnny
was as innocent as a lamb!
This was in 1895 and Jenkins and
| were seated in box in Metropoli
| tan hall reporting speech to a
silver convention" by the distinguish
| ed Kansas orator aforesaid. He was
swinging his arms and earning his
\ money beyond 4 doubt and
| had just gotten on the money
| power when he spied us. Why
| we should have looked cor
| rupt / Go not know: neither of us was
much bigger than a minute" and
| our clothes certainly had nothing of
| the mold of form about them:
| do not know what Jenkins was MAX
| ing but L do know that the pay 7 got
| on the afternoon paper consisted OF
what was left after everybody else
| was paid off" and sometimes
amounted to as much as $500 a
| Week-and l didn't feel rich.
| However this may be. the orator
| saw us and we raised his bile: "Oh
| this awful serpent of greed" he
| shouted. '"This octopus of money
| reaching out its tentacles to crush the
! best and purest institutions in the
land; il has crawled its Shiny length
ITO legislative halls--it has dared
v countrymen, dared to enthrall.
capture and dazzle with it's dirty
YRS the Fourth State-the P-presS,
the tribune of the people has be-
{ the servant of greed-it sits
GLOW, citizens-Here!-in this
/ impudent the irreverent,
the corrupt Press!!"
sn 1 the last words. the cora
| Ha1sG across the stage. his
| in ng like the shaking head
| of /. ut to strike and stopped
L To,