The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-06-28

ment to reduce the representation from the South.
 Governor--No. am not. Let them altogether exclude the negro from vot- ing and Alabama can well afford to have fewer Representatives. besides, Fort. reducing the quantity. might im- prove the What was that. did you not hear a noise7 t
 Fort-No, My Liege. did not
 Governor-well. deefare,I thought l heard Wallace out there In the hall. Tell them in the other ofice I say, Hold the fort" No. don't mean that. Tell them to say to anyNand all callers. that am engaged. (Exit Fort)
 Re-enter Fort.
 Fort. you spoke this morning of hay ing found some lines. like my verse Of poetry on the deeR Read them.
 Fort (reading)--
 Miss Prosperity came to the State. a
 gracious Queen,
 A fairer vision was never seen; She touched the waste places. doomed. When, presto! they. like garden
 bloomed.
 Smoke from the iron furnace. rose. The miner "roll'd in wealth" as the saying goes;
 On farm, in mlne and In busy mart Advancement giaddened every heart. When out went the call for Special Then began the tide of retrogres- sion:
 Bills prepared as the Governor pleased Were rushed through like lightning greased. To the injndicious it was largely blab, To Miss Prosperity. fearful stab. | The people turned aside to weep. | Whdle Miss Prosperity retired to sleep | AEt 4A xrAN | the trashiest stuff have ever heardf Fort-well. My Liege. the lines | might contain a grain of wholesome | truth like unpalatable oil put up In in- | nocent looking bottles. Governor-I am really glad. Fort, I that Miss Prosperity is not going to die. I didn't think the wound she received amounted to much.
 Fort-There you are mistaken, My Liege. While not a parallel case, I am reminded of what brave Mercutio, when Romeo told him that the wound inhict- ed by envfoi1s Tybalt could not amount to much, said: NO. 'tis not so deep as | a well, nor so wide as a church door: but 'tis enough" But she win recov- | CT. My Liege. in fact. she is very much improved already and in few months will be as well and as beautiful as | ever.
 I W2z to do? Didn't Milton H. Smith. in one of his letters to me. admit that there were certain things about the rail roads which ought to be regulatedi He has been the autocrat of the Louis vile and Nashville Railroad Company for more than twenty years and could have corrected these abuses, why did he not do so7
 Fort-My Liege! Regulation is one thing and confiscRtion another IAre you in a position to com plain that the railroads did not them selves correct these errors? That you are fllling ths office of Governor today is due to that omission.
 Governor-Then why all this talk Where did I wrong in trying to have them corrected7
 Fort-But. My Liege, the railroad companies say you didn't try to rec tify abuses, but to confiscate their prop. erty. In the play of 'The Lion and the Lamb" Judge Jones points out with clearness and precision these irregular tiles of the railroads: he said they con- sisted O. petty annoyances on the part of some railroad oficials-want of at. | tention to complaints on the part ot shippers |and the public and unjust | ldiscriminations in the matter oi freights between place and place. He | compared them to the fly which an moved the sleeping man (the railroads) and said he ought to be killed. but care should be taken in killing the fly moi to kill the man. When a State I,egislature attempts to reduce the rates of a railroad without first as- certaining If the income can stand the reduction, then the Constitution of the