The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1921-10-19
ON SECOND THOUGHT
BY JAY E. HOUSE
(From Philadelphia Public Ledger.)

Topeka. Kan, Oct. IL
OF all the states, but three will live in
Old Massachusetts with her Plymouth
And old Virginia with her noble stock,
And Sunny Kansas with her woes and
These three, will live in song and oratory,
While all the others, with their idle claims,
VIII only be remembered as mere names.
From the Rhymes of Ironquill
So wrote Eugene T. Ware (Iron-
quil) thirty-odd years ago. Ware was
a Kansas notable of the generation
which settled the state on the heels of
the Civil war, in which he had fought
with distinction and in which he rose
from the ranks to a captains commits
sion. He was Theodore Roosevelt's
commissioner of pensions. An able
lawyer with an extensive practice,
he dabbled much in politics, as is the
Kansas custom among men of parts
and consequence. But all of his life
he wrote timely verse, couched in the
homelier forms of speech and express
ing the moods and reactions of his
class and type. Two or three bound
volumes are his literary monument,
and one of these, THE Rhymes OF
Ironquill,' rescued from the oblivion
of a Topeka book shop today. Ware
| is dead and forgotten save by those
of his contemporaries who survive
him; but he was a philosopher of Sc
renity, and to one who is surfeited
with the outpourings of the pot
metaF' school of poesy his sturdy
verse is a pleasing stimulus to iife's
golden glow Probably Ware never
was read to any extent east of the AL
leghenies; but he never wrote an I'M
healthful or dissipated line. He never
kcried out in anguish or inscribed u
roundelay of woe to the history of his
time. Not so much can be Said for
many of thoseswho now attempt to in
terpret life in metrieal measures.
In reprinting the foregoing excerpt
from 1.-The Rhymes of Ironquill," I
had thought merely to point certain
| observations I had intended making
concerning the Kansas of today. Be
fore proceeding I am tempted to re-
print Ware sap ostrophe to whist. OF
all his verse. THE Washerwoman's
Song" is the best known and was the
most widely read; but that is too long
for reproduction here. whist" more
nearly accommodates itself to the linn
itations of this column and is quite as
faithful reflection of Ware at his
best.
Hour after hour the cards were fairly shut
And fairly dealt, but still I got no hand
The morning came, and with a mind IN
I only said, 81 do not understand"
Life is as game of whist. From unseen
The cards are shuffled and the hands are
Blind are our efforts to control the forces
That tho unseen, are no less strongly
felt.
do not like the way the cards are shut
And yet like the game and want to
And thru the long, long night will I, I'M
ruffled,
Play what I get until the break of day.
When Ware wrote whist he was
thinking of poker, and that was the
original title of the verses. But Mrs.
Ware considered poker a gambling
game. and as such abhorred it, She
did not wish TO see her husbands
name publicly linked with that form
of speculation, and so he changed the
title to whist" And thus it stands
in the lines that serve to keep his
memory green.
Wares tribute to kansas with her
woes and glory" was a faithful reflex
of the thought and spirit of the Kan
sas Of his time. = Keenly alert and in
tellectually superior to it's neighbors,
it was a commonwealth of social,
moral and political crusaders and
swashbucklers. 1t was ever in full
cry, and while it never knew exactly
where it was going, it was always on
the way me people sang Jne SiOTy
of the State as they cOmmuned in
sweet sorrow over the vices and fail
ings of mankind, the while the bitter
sweet of their own tears trickled upon
their common woes. For nearly
generation Wall street was the chop
ping-b7ock of orators and agitators.
None of them knew anything about
Wall street; few had seen it. But any
demogogue seeking a fresh start could
come into Kansas and achieve it by
the simple device of denouncing Wall
street. One Kansas man wrote a book
called 1.-The Great Red Dragon of Wall
Street." At that time he never had
been east of the Mississippi river. He
had never been possessed of anything
Wall street wanted or would have.
But the sale of his book ran into the
thousands of copies and gave him such
vogue that he was elected to State
office on the strength of it. AS late
ase 1917 a distinguished Kansan was
going about over the State making
war speeches predicated on the prop
osition that Kansas young men were
better Drawer and more efficient SOL
diers than those from any other state.
And his audiences late it up" There
still are those who believe Kansas won
the war.
Now the point to all this is that
some of the agents of fermentation
have gone from the Kansas prescrip-
ton. The state still is keenly alert
and intellectually superior. But it has
pretty nearly stopped kidding itself;
it is throwing fewer fits than ever be-
fore in its history. Probably the
change has been going on for a long
time, bat so slowly as to be imper-
ceptible to those in close touch with
conditions. But after an absence of
two and one-half years it has become
very marked to me. Last winter Lucy
Page CASTOR, Nemesis of the cigaret
came to Kansas to start trouble. The
Kansas Anti-Cigaret law always has
been openly and sha elessly violated.
It still is, for that matter. Miss Cas-
ton selected Kansas as crusading
ground and started in to drive the So
called deadly coffin-nail'' into the
ditch in which John Barleycorn pre-
sumedly reclines. A few of the old
time crusaders Joined her organiza-