WHEN William H.

Seward bought Alaska for us in 1867 for $7,200,000, the newspapers that

passed judgment on everything, declared in shrill black face that Seward was stung. One man tried to introduce a bill in Congress providing for an investigation as to how much commission Seward had received from Russia for bringing about the deal.

Several news

papers openly declared that Seward was certainly working

The illumination of St. Patrick's Cathedral in honor of the Cardinal. Every turret and cornice had been wired, so that when the power was turned on, the whole building flashed out in lines of fire

both ends against the

middle, and was

getting rich by cultivating the expense account.

We now realize, however, that next to the real estate deal made by Thomas Jefferson, when he carried through the Louisiana Purchase, Seward's purchase of Alaska stands first.

Alaska produced, in the year just closed, nineteen million dollars in gold.

The copper mines of Alaska

have not been worked, but it

of Alaska to be opened

up for the good of

the world.

Conservation, like

every

Our Prisoner the Indian

NONGRESS has passed an act, which has been duly signed by President Taft, permitting the erection in New York harbor of a mem

orial to the North American Indians.

This

on the initiative of Mr. Rodman Wanamaker.

There used to be Indians all over America, and everywhere, even to this day, the plowedup ground gives out bits of tangible testimony of a people dead and turned to dust, living only in legend and in these mute relics in the way of weapons and implements.

Even their descendants do not know where they came from, how they lived, and the extent of their hopes, ambitions, and aspirations.

The North American Indian has been subdued within our own time. We have changed his mode of life. The fields, the prairies, the woods, the streams are no longer his. He is a prisoner. He

The Duke of Connaught, Canada's new Governor-General, and his party, good-naturedly submitting to a hold-up by

other good thing, can be overdone.

One horseshoe brings you good

luck, but a load of horseshoes is junk.

Write it on the walls of Con

gress!

during their recent visit to New York City. The Duke is shown at the bottom of the page, and his daughter, the Princess Patricia, at the top

cannot leave his reservation without permission. He is a ward, a pensioner, and the heart has gone out of him.

What he was once we can only imagine, but no one familiar with

the Indians but hazards the guess that he is the remnant of a once great and powerful people. He reveals rudimentary qualities which show that he has in him the dying germ of genius.

When Keokuk, the Indian Chief, met General Scott in council, Keokuk sat on the grass and waited for General Scott to begin the interview. The presence of General Scott, his spangled uniform, and even his formidable guard, with the instruments of death at the bidding of a nod, inspired no terror in the heart of Keokuk.

Keokuk waited, and finally General Scott became nervous and twitched and his dignity oozed away.

Was this because Keokuk had more reserve and latent power than Scott, or was old Keokuk simply stupid?

Strong men are never subdued by stupidity. Only personality affects personality. Scott and Keokuk fought that silent duel of the spirit, which we all daily have to fight, and the stronger man won. Keokuk,the Indian, conquered because he had more soul-gravity than Scott the Anglo-Saxon.

And the end of the Indian race is this rare memorial in bronze and marble. It is fitting that the Indians should be thus honored. We owe it to ourselves. We can do very little to undo the injustice and the savagery that we have heaped upon them. They were the victims of destiny, and our engines of civilization have been the juggernauts that have crushed them into dust. Soon they will be but a memory. The monument is proper and right, and it will be something. of dignity and beauty and worth, telling

mutely of the virtues of the people who once lived and died.

The common idea is that the Indians are decreasing in numbers. The real fact is, this is not the case. However, the Indian is ceasing to be an Indian.

The number of Indians in America in 1890 was 248,000. In 1910, the census showed 266,000 Indians.

These were the Indians living on the reservations, and it is well enough to state in the interests of truth that a great many of these "Indians" would pass for white men if they were off the reservation. Visit any Indian school and you will find that over one-half of the students show no trace, to the casual eye, of Indian blood. But as a negro is a negro, although he may be nine-tenths white, so is an Indian an Indian,

rate of $1.15 is unreasonable, unjust, improper, and out of place and that hereafter the rate shall be $1.00 per hundred and no more; and it orders all common carriers to make the rate effective on February 15.

This clashing of the Inter-state Commerce Commission and the Commerce Court may lead to new complications, and some say that the Commerce Court will be wiped out of existence if it assumes the right of throwing lemons at its little brother that was born first.

However that may be, it looks as if the lower rate on lemons is bound to stand, this to the satisfaction of the lemon-growers as well as the lemon consumers.

Charm of Manner

fourths engineer.

The point is, that the characteristics that have marked the North American Indian are things of the past. The new generations are taking on the white characteristics. The Indian is merging himself with the mass, and it is believed that in fifty years he will be absolutely indistinguishable. The reservations will be divided up into farms-just as the Blackfeet reservation is in Montana-the Indians will become farmers and stockmen, and the public schools- and intermarriage with the whites will do the rest.

THE

The Lemon Crop

HE Inter-state Commerce Commission has handed a lemon to the Commerce Court by reaffirming its order that the rate on lemons from California to all points in the East should be $1.00 a hundred pounds instead of $1.15, as heretofore.

This is a great victory for California. Heretofore, we were in competition with Sicily, the lemons coming from across the sea by the shipload.

The Commerce Court upset the order of the Inter-state Commerce Commission for the dollar rate, holding that the Commission had no right to consider the question of foreign competition in making rates. To do this was to take sides with producers.

It was a sharp criticism from the higher court to the lower one. But now the lower court comes back, entirely waiving the question of competition, and says that the

To have Charm of Manner you do not have to be rich, highly educated, or handsome. All you have to do is to be sympathetic, sensible, honest, gracious, considerate, and reasonably ambitious.

Once in a department store, I wished to buy a cake of soap. I asked for a brand that I happened to remember, at fifteen cents a cake. The saleswoman wrapped up the cake of soap and handed it to me, and as she did so said, "Here is another kind that we sell two cakes for a quarter-you see, it is a little larger cake, and, while I'm not certain, I believe you will like it better-and I am sure that you want the best."

"Give me four cakes of that last," I said, and slapped down a half dollar.

I really wanted only one cake of soap, because I had forgotten to put a cake in my valise, and I would be back home in two days anyway, but that girl's Charm of Manner caught me, and I took her advice. She was so gracious, so kindly, and so interested in pleasing me, and worked in such a delicate little compliment that, in some way, I felt as though she had taken her scissors and snipped off a big red rose, the dew still on it, and handed it to me.

Not all salespeople have Charm of Manner-this charm that is born of concentration, intelligence, and consideration.

To have Charm of Manner you must have both respect for yourself and for the other person. Had that girl been bold or "fresh," it would have dissipated her charm. She