has threatened to spank Br'er Jonathan, and even Italy talked of calling him to account with a few old iron tubs! Here are the figures, approved by the leading financial journals of Europe, giving the tangible wealth of the leading nations of the world in the year 1890: United States, more than 61 billion dollars; Great Britain, 47 billions; France, 43 billions; Germany, 32 billions; Russia, 252 billions; Italy, 15 billions, and Spain, 13 billions. Reduced to $20 gold pieces, the wealth of the United States would belt the world fifty times, with enough left over to buy the city of London and blow that modern Sodom into the sea. The wealth of the United States has wonderfully increased during the past half dozen years, while that of England has practically remained in statu quo, hence the difference is much greater than the foregoing figures indicate. Wealth has ever constituted "the sinews of war." It does so to-day more than ever before. The day of personal prowess on the battlefield is practically a thing of the past; it is now a question of who can pay for the best ships and the most effective guns. America can do this; ergo, America is the world's master. John Bull has the most powerful navy and could, for a few months, harry our coast; but Uncle Sam could block up the entrance to one of his numerous bays, build a fleet greater than his enemy could possibly pay for, then send it forth to take the British Isles in part payment for the damage done. But it is urged that this nation is deep in debt. Granted; but its contemporaries are even more artistically tarred with the same stick. In 1890 the public debt of the United States amounted to $14.63 per capita-and Americans exceed all other peoples in wealth-creating and debtpaying capacity. The per capita debt of Great Britain and Ireland was $87.79; of France, $116.35; of AustroHungary, $70.34; of Prussia, $37.03; of Russia, $30.79.

The provinces of Great Britain are even worse burdened with debt than is the mother country, the per capita ranging from $333.46 in Queensland to $49.51 in Canada. Neither Great Britain nor her provinces can or will ever get out of debt—all their creditors hope for is the interest. Uncle Sam can easily discharge all his obligations in five years-less than $3 per year per capita. But it is said that a great deal of American property is owned abroad. True; but what the devil do we care who owns it while the taxes levied thereon go into our coffers-so long as we can confiscate it, if need be, and employ it to drill large rectangular holes through its proprietors? The property is here -more than seventy-five billions of it in this year of grace -and every penny of it is subject to American law-can be employed to the last farthing in defense of our flag. That is a fact which our Anglo-maniacal friends (?) too often forget. Another thing: the British journals are rejoicing that "America's war talk cost her a billion dollars by depreciation in her stocks and bonds." From the eagerness to take the last federal loan, and the price at which it was placed, it does not appear that we have suffered very seriously. Bonds and stocks are not wealth -they are only evidences of indebtedness. If it be true, as claimed, that our bonds and stocks are chiefly owned in England, and that their value has been shaved a billion dollars by the war scare, I cannot see where John Bull's laugh comes in. We are a billion dollars ahead and he is a billion dollars behind, according to my arithmetic. We have the property and he holds the depreciated bonds. If we can reduce our foreign indebtedness a billion dollars by twisting the lion's tail, suppose we continue to tie double bow-knots in it until we do not owe our transAtlantic cousin a dollar. It appears that we can make more money baiting Britain's royal beast than by planting

hogs. John Bull is giving an imitation of a man who goes on a hilarious jag because his house burned down when he had no insurance.

***

PROTECTION VS. FREE TRADE.

A HACKNEYED Subject?

Sure!

Everybody, from Dr. Adam Smith to Rebecca Merlindy Johnson has taken a fall out of it; and still the Gordian knot defies the fingers of the foolish-awaits the sword of an Alexander.

I have dodged the question, simply because everybody else was talking about it, and each and all appeared to understand it so perfectly-and differently-that there was really nothing more to be said. At last, however, I have been dragged into controversy by the coat-tails, when I would much rather discuss unkissed kisses and unsung songs. A gentleman writes from Ballinger to the effect that a dispute has arisen there regarding my position on this supposedly important question, and asks that I spill a little kerosene upon the troubled waters by stating what I may think that I think about it.

I think that this whole controversy is simply an aggravated case of Much Ado About Nothing. It reminds me of the quarrel between Calvin and Servetus as to whether Christ is "the eternal Son of God" or "the son of the Eternal God." It is another case of Homoiousianism vs. Homoousianism. It has often been a great political issue but never an economic question of paramount importance. The press and politicians have wrangled over it and drenched their celluloid collars with perspiration, as though it were some new and greater Edipusean riddle which the

nation must rede if it would avoid commercial death and industrial damnation.

If every "tariff wall" in this world should collapselike those of Jericho before the horn-blowing and bellowing of the Democratic Israel-they would not long be missed. If every foot of terra firma, with the exception of these United States, were sunk a thousand fathoms into the sea, thereby depriving us forever of foreign trade and transAtlantic competition, it would not check our onward march. Our bull would still gender, our cow still calve, the sheep and goats continue to crop the rich herbage on a thousand hills. God would still give to us the night and the morning, the seed-time and the harvest. The emerald plains of the mighty North would grow golden in the autumn glow, and the cotton fields of the mystic South burst into pearly foam beneath the sensuous kiss of the summer sun, while mine and factory and forest continued as of yore to pour their priceless treasures into the nation's purse.

This is the foremost nation of the world-the first in wealth, energy, intelligence and productive capacity per capita. The nation that long undersells by so much as 1 per cent. in any industry adapted to our soil and the genius of our people must underlive us from 10 to 50 per cent. I am not afraid to back the brawn and brain of my countrymen against the "pauper labor" of other lands. I am a mechanic, and proud of the fact that there are three trades in my fingers. I have been a contractor, and employed men from almost every clime upon which shines the sun, and I do know that in wealth-creating ability the American mechanic hasn't a peer upon the earth. Others are copyists and plodders and time-servers, whose chief ambition is to wear out the day. They seldom hope to rise above that station to which they were born.

The American never quits learning. He mocks at precedent and seeks new labor-saving plans. He aspires to make every edge cut-to utilize to the utmost every atom of force. While his feet are in the trenches, his head is among the stars. Ambition's fires beat in every drop of his blood. Wealth and honor constitute his shining goal. Hope never leaves his heart until he is ready for the pauper's grave. He is a storm-center of resistless energy, because not content while in all the earth there stands aught above him. The common laborer of America has no equal among his fellows. He will do as much in a day as will four Mexicans or three Chinamen, almost as much as two men from the slow-going countries of Continental Europe. Uncle Sam's tin-bucket brigade does not fear the "pauper labor" of far lands. Give us piece work, an even break, and we'll grow fat on beef while our competitors starve on bouillon; we'll eat pie while they are feastnig on wind-pudding. The American workman wants no protection from the coolies of China, the peons of Mexico, the lazzaroni of Italy, or the anæmic wretches who crowd the garrets of London and Paris, Berlin and Vienna. The lion does not fear the louse. The American workman wants protection only from the godless greed of domestic wealth. He wants to be assured possession of all that his labor produces.

It is not my present purpose to enter into an exhaustive discussion of the problem of Protection vs. Free Trade. It is old straw that has been industriously rethreshed for more than a century, without benefiting anybody so far as I can find. It is distinctively a "local question." Everybody wants to buy in a cheap and sell in a dear market; hence the man whose products are capable of protection wants a "tariff wall," while those whose products are articles of export, are for free trade from start to finish. Calhoun was a protectionist when there was a pros