The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1911-03-17

he rose to greet the youngster and
while he stood smiling down at him
party entered and began a hurried
confidential consultation with him. He
talked with them, but he kept his
eyes mostly on the baby boy, whils
1t was plain enough that his grown
callers were wincing at the young
to stop stabbing things with that tin
sword. Once or twice, when he gal
loped by. Clark touched him. gently,
charmingly:
When the boy had tired himself,
and all the visitors, except myself
Clark went into the little room which
is his private office. 1t is at one
side of the larger room in which his
secretary sits and to whcih visitors
are first admitted. There Mr..
Speaker elect Clark received a defin-
lite call from the young man-receiv-
ed it very suddenly and unexpectedly
and yehemently. The boy literally
assailed him, joyously and unafraid.
Clark caught him in his arms.
so you're a soldier are you"
'sYeth.''
Well here's quarter for the
Commissary Department
l have never seen finer smile than
that with which he gave young Bass
ford this money for supplies.
nectiop with this love for children, I
shall tell now, for the first time in
print, a little anecdote which illus
trates its strength and, also, the man
steadfastness to resolution.
Many, many years ago his oldest
child, baby boy, was playing on his
lap while he was smoking a cigar.
The little one-year-old was burned by
the cigar end. Indignant with him
self, Clark threw the Cigar from him,
declaring that he would never smoke
again. He never has.
This baby died just after his third
birthday, and Clark himself nearly
died of his great grief. He said, re-
Gently:
Never day passes during the
course of which do not think of our
poor baby"
That baby boy has now been gone
almost quarter of century, yet
every day he thinks of him! No man
was ever more devoted to his chill
dren, and his love for them is big
enough to take in also every other
little child he comes in contact with.
After the boy had left us once more
quite alone, my mind went back to
the matter of the increased cost of
living.
James is HILL" I suggested, "says
that the American people are extrav-
agant. He says they have gone mad
with spending"
1.-THE increase of wages has not
kept pace with the increased cost of
living" Mr.. Clark replied, land this
Isl most unfortunate. Wages have
increased, but the cost of living has
increased three times as fast as wages
have increased. One Of two things
must happen, either the increase of
wages must keep pace with the in
creased cost of living, or the cost of
ixyiy1c OF ho - h.
harmony with wages. Otherwise the
condition of the wage-earner must
get worse and worse and the scale of
living must degenerate.
ST have no doubt that my good
friend, Mr.. Hill, is correct, to some
extent, when he charges that the Am
erican people are extravaganza. 7
think that he is one of the greatest
men in America, and I set great store
by his opinion upon any subject
doubt that the American people are
the most extravagant people on the
face Of the earth, but their extrava-
gance does not account for the condi-
ton in which the masses of the peo-
pie find themselves; for it is extreme
ly difficult for the average head of a
family who is not extravagant to keep
his head above water.
"Of course, Am orleans who are ex-
travagant are extrava CANT upon the
principle or come easy, go easy The
average head of family in the Unit
ed States earns only about $500 an
nualiy, and with rents and every
thing else going UP faster than his
wages are, he cannot be very extrav-
agant, however; and his prospects in
life are not very alluring. The two
things which Congress can and should
do to help him out of this situation
are to cut down the tariff on the
necessaries of life, and to insist that
Can these things be accomplish
ed without q tremendous business
cata clysm 2" / inquired.
Eyes. The Walker Tariff Bill was
passed in 1916 and remained on the
statute books unchanged, until the
second day of March, 1857 a period
of eleven years. 1t was on the av-
erage a great reduction of the rates
Of. Henry Clay's tariff bill of 1912
James G. Blaine, in his Twenty
Years of Congress- states that the
eleven years of the Walker tariff bill
were the most prosperous in the life
of the republic. and that the people
were so thoroughly satisfied with il,
that in 1856, after it had been in op-
Grafton ten years, neither one of the
great parties which presented Presi-
Dental candidates even mentioned
the tariff subject in it's platform. That
was a happy condition of affairs
which did not exist before and never
has existed since.
$50 thoroughly were the people sat
isfied with low tariff in those days
that on the second day of March