The Birmingham age-herald., 1905-09-06
From the Pathfinder.

fTOm the Patnnnder.
 N COMPARATIVELY few speakers
 S or writers of the present day O make any use of that rich mine of material which has been bequeathed to us by the past-that wealth of allusion af- forded by classic literature and tradition. In fact, the world is fast losing hold of all this vast lore; there are few people in the average modern audience who are familiar with the universe of fable. and the public is impatient of references they don't understand the point of. so that even if writers and speakers themselves are versed In these things they seldom indulge in them for fear of appearing suited
 This is an unfortunate condition, for it means that before many years this whole subject of classic knowledge will become a closed book, except to few antiquarians and book-worms. But the present-day public is intensely practical; 1t Is absorbed in facts and figures. and 1t has an abiding faith in these inhexible realities as to the all-in-all of life; 1t does not want to harlx back to the lessons of any musty mythology or defer to the lteIJnlilbh Oi sdBtS Wnos 1t appears, knew nothing about the K rays or other like modern discoveries.
 There are, of course. still many who go back to original sources and who delve deeply in classic and standard literature instead of being content with the skim mings presented to them in the literature of the day. Charles J. Bonaparte, the new secretary of the navy. is one of these. Not content with a fine education origin ally. he brings his studious habits with him Into everything he undertakes. He belongs to the type of educated states men-a type more rare with us than in the Old World, where learning has not yet been so thoroughly inoculated with modernism and fact.
 Mir. Bonaparte never talks five minutes without enriching his views with allu- sions to his extensive reading. As con- crete example of his style, we quote random extract from a speech made by him at a recent convention of editors in Maryland He was making an appeal against the so-called Poe amendment. which that state is considering the adop- ton of, placing it in the power of the election boards to withhold the ballot from certain classes of citizens.
 Some politicians were making tho plea that the proposed amendment should at least be tried and then discarded if it did not prove success, but this plea, said Secretary Bonaparte, argues in those who use it enough brass to rebuild the Colossus of Rhodes"
 Then he went on to round out his idea by further allusions, as follows: " The horse in Aesops fables asks the man to help him to get rid of the stag who trespasses on his pasture. and to erect this allows the man to get on his back and put bit in his mouth. The hunt ended, he suggests that the man dis mount and set him at liberty, but the man doesn't see 1t in that light. and Is still the rider and master today. When sinbad took the Old Man of the Sea on his back he at least acted In ignorance; we shall put on this shirt of Nessus with full warning that, once on. it can never be pulled of.
 Here were four ''booky" references in less than that many minutes talk; and who can say that they did not greatly strengthen the speakers argument that