on, like the Wandering Jew, forced to move on forever,— finding a right to stop nowhere, unless we comply with the conditions which those owners have a legal right to impose upon But by another set of laws we may even be denied the privilege of moving on, for we might be arrested as vagrants.

us.

On account of the influences and ideas already mentioned, the lawmaking powers have acted on the theory that the prime and exclusive object of all land legislation is to protect the landholders in the exercise of the widest possible range of rights and powers. In this as in many other instances the laws protect the strong against the weak. Those laws give landholders a power over their hired men and tenants that is absolutely unjust. Here in the State from which I write a State that boasts of the protection it gives to labor and to poor men- there is no "exemption " in favor of tenants against landlords' claims for rent. A claim for rent takes precedence over everything, even a claim for wages. If my employer happens to be a tenant farmer, his landlord can take the entire crop and every visible thing he owns, if required to satisfy a claim for rent. And then he can evict us both, and send us out homeless and penniless - both robbed of our labor. America has her evictions as cruel as those of Ireland.

We can grant the landowner all of his legitimate rights, and then effect important reforms. For, according to a just and proper interpretation of our present land system, "the land is the heritage of the people." Considered as the territory of our government, the land is not the exclusive property of the persons who "own" the farms. Considered in that relation and as a public utility the land belongs to the government, or to the people. As it involves the interests, the rights, and the opportunities of all persons, the rich and the poor should have an equal voice in the public control of the land. All should have an equal voice in all questions of its relation to the common welfare.

I am aware that farmers themselves are now complaining of adverse conditions and poverty. I know that many people will argue that we are not justified in forcing an agitation in behalf of our class at this time, while farmers them

selves, our employers, are forced to fight against such serious adversities. But we demand nothing that should make farmers any poorer. We believe that the evils against which we protest are detrimental to farmers as well as to ourselves. The one great justification of the labor movement is the fact that none of its essential demands would limit or curtail any of the legitimate rights and privileges of employers or of any other class of people. It is not to low wages and to subservience on the part of farm hands that the farmers of this country must look for a means of escape from the hard conditions that now environ them.

A discussion of the labor question on the farm at this time tends to simplify rather than complicate the great problem of agricultural discontent. By thus bringing to view the interests of all elements of the farming population, farmers are able to obtain a much more comprehensive knowledge of the real evils that confront them. With a proper understanding of their relations to other elements of the community and to other industrial classes, they will learn that former farmers' movements were failures because they were too self-contained, and were conducted in defiance of the real demands of the times. Though attempting political affiliation with labor organizations, those movements, in general trend and effect, have operated as a counter-current to the true labor movement.

It is not the purpose of this article to outline the reforms that may be necessary. But the enactment of a few disconnected, specific laws will not suffice. We do not need new laws so much as we need a change of the recognized principles and theories that underlie all law. The thing needed now most of all is to inculcate into the public mind a better scheme of political economy and a new social philosophy, for the guidance of lawmakers and courts.

The real purpose of this article is to call attention to the actual condition of our class. It is to be hoped that a better knowledge of the social condition of the farm laboring class will enable the people to discover some solution of the present agricultural discontent that will benefit and satisfy both farmer and farm hand.

TOPEKA, KANSAS.

PRACTICAL MEASURES FOR PROMOTING
MANHOOD AND PREVENTING CRIME.

THE

BY B. O. FLOWER.

HE capital lesson for us to learn to-day is that the interest of each is the interest of all, and that any society which is indifferent to the welfare of the weak and unfortunate will sooner or later pay bitterly for its selfish neglect. The solidarity of the race is such that the injury of a single unit affects the other units, and in a greater or less degree injures the society in which the wronged one dwells. A large proportion of the vast sums expended yearly for the protection of property and life and for sustaining prisons, penitentiaries, reformatories, and almshouses would be saved had society the wisdom and forethought to take steps to aid the weak and unfortunate to reach honorable paths of endeavor, and at the same time to place within their reach pleasant resorts where good music, ennobling art, and entertaining pastimes would give brightness to their few leisure hours, thus lending a new charm to life, while subtly educating and uplifting them by filling their minds with pure and morally healthful ideas.

Perhaps the importance of giving society's unfortunates bright surroundings during their leisure hours will be better appreciated if we consider for a moment how largely life is the result of that which environs the individual. And at the outset it is necessary that we keep in mind two great facts frequently overlooked by teachers and philosophers. Man is essentially an imitative animal, and is largely the creature of habit or emotion, or of both. Dull minds-dwarfed, blunted, or stunted mentalities are frequently almost devoid of imagination. They pass through life for the most part creatures of imitation and habit. They do that which they see others do, or that which they have been accustomed to do themselves. They drift through life in an aimless sort of manner. If temptations are at hand, if degradation and evil are on

every side, they fall into evil ways because of their environment, because they are weak and imitative, and because doing wrong soon becomes a habit. habit. Before they are conscious of it they do as others do, until habits are formed which in time become second nature. Of course degradation or evildoing is progressive, and the downward course of these weaklings is accelerated as they journey through life. But the greatest factors in their unfortunate careers have been environment, the propensity to imitate, and the spell of habit when once acquired.

Not so with most young people, and with persons of bright mentality. Here the imagination sways the sceptre in the thought world and draws its very life from the planes of emotion. If the emotions are stimulated on the higher or spiritual plane of sensation, the world of imagination is made luminous with high, refining, and altruistic ideals. If the lower planes of sensation are appealed to, the imagination is influenced and filled with sensual and essentially selfish emotions.

Hence we see at a glance how music, which appeals so strongly to the emotional nature, may be an inestimable blessing or an immeasurable curse according to whether it appeals to the higher or lower planes of sensation, according to whether it fills the world of the imagination with exalted and divine ideals or with pictures calculated to arouse the lower nature. Thus we readily understand how positively debasing the dance-hall songs and music are, and we can easily believe the truth of the following statement made by the eminent English clergyman and author Rev. H. R. Haweis: "I have known the oratorio of The Messiah' to draw the lowest dregs of Whitechapel into a church to hear it, and during the performance sobs have broken forth from the silent and attentive throng." Anything which strongly arouses the emotional nature on the spiritual plane clarifies the soul, strengthens all good resolutions, and gives life an upward inspiration. Society has not yet learned this great lesson; nor has it considered another fact of equal importance in its bearing upon social progress-the far-reaching and life-influencing character of impressions borne in upon the mind in the brief hours when the

brain of the toiler is relaxed and receptive and when his body is at rest. At such times the imagination receives and stores away images, pictures, and trains of association suggested by what has been given to it, and these become food for the mind or form conscious or unconscious ideals which engross the thought in future life.

When the emotional nature is profoundly stirred by splendid or inspiring music, impressions are frequently given to the mind which change the whole current of life. This also is frequently the case where the music or the object which appeals to the emotion awakens trains of association long buried but hallowed by holy remembrances of a happy childhood.

An incident illustrating this was related to me by Mother Pindle of the Florence Crittenden Home in New York. One evening some one was playing on the chapel organ of that wonderful home for unfortunate women. The piece was one of the familiar hymns so dear to the hearts of our people. Soon the little congregation joined in the hymn. Outside, a poor unfortunate girl who had been betrayed, and whose life from the time of her ruin had been a continuous descent, was passing. As the familiar air fell on her ear she started and then stood as if riveted to the sidewalk. At length she stepped into the service room, and before the hymn was over she had broken into violent sobbing. The attentive matron and her earnest co-workers surrounded her, and in answer to their kindly questions she gave them the story of her life, and related how the hymn, which had been her mother's favorite before she died, had overcome her, how it had brought up before her all the lessons her mother had striven to teach, and how she had resolved to live a purer life. All this had happened some years before the story was told to me, and the poor girl then saved by a hymn had developed into one of the most helpful workers for the unfortunates in the city.

Hundreds of similar cases could be recited, showing the power of good music in arousing the divine in the human clay and leading to spiritual supremacy. I emphasize music because of its influence on young and old, because it sings itself into the soul, because it stirs the emotions so pro