Bro. E. W. Keever of Lodge 359, writes the Magazine that he has copies of nearly all the Magazines published from November, 1895, to the present time, which he will dispose of at a reasonable price to anyone who may want them. His address is 1405 F. street, Bakersfield, Cal.

Bro. John Bergschicker, Master of Lodge 527, Bellefontaine, Ohio, writes: "Our lodge is growing rapidly. We have over fifty members and eight applications on file. Everything is moving along all right. We had a visit from our Vice Grand Master on the 7th of January, which was much enjoyed by all present. We held a special meeting, but on account of the short notice we did not have a very large attendance, but the meeting was a grand success in every sense of the word."

According to the New Albany (Ind.) Press of January 13, 1903, the members of the B. of L. F. employed on the Louisville-St. Louis Division of the Southern Railroad have presented Mr. Frank Busching, a passenger engineer on that road, with a handsome silver service in recognition of services rendered them in securing increased wages.

Bro. J. M. McQuaid, of Herington, Kan., writes the Magazine that he is acting as Secretary and Treasurer of the

C., R. I. & P. Joint Protective Board, vice G. F. Phillips, resigned.

Bro. J. A. Anderson of Lodge 86, at Laramie, Wyo., writes the Magazine that they now have a legislative board in that State, and although it did not accomplish anything at the session of the Legislature just past it expects to do a little business in the next two years.

A member of Lodge 235 writes the Magazine that at a recent examination with his answers to the questions asked the railway officials were so well pleased that they wanted to know where he got his information. He told them from the Locomotive Firemen's Magazine. He does not know what mark he received, but does know that they were very well pleased.

Anyone having a complete file of the copies of the Locomotive Firemen's Magazine for the year 1893, unbound and in good condition, can probably exchange the same for a bound volume of the Magazine for 1893. The reason for this exchange is that the bound volume in the office of the

Magazine does not include the advertising pages, and it is desired that the official volume of the Magazine for each year, which is preserved in the office library, shall contain everything, even to the cover pages.

The soldier loves a martial life,
The sailor loves the sea,
The merchant loves the city strife,
But a railroad life for me.

The mighty engine is our pride,
That swiftly speeds along,

As over the rails we smoothly glide,
To the drivers' dashing song.

Away we speed before the wind,
The landscape rushing by,
The city spires rise far behind,
Against the western sky.

The forest hears the whistle shriek,
And echoes back again,
Then on we rush o'er mountain bleak,
Through wind and driving rain

Dark rocks and woods are flying past,
In evening's gathering gloom,
As down grade we are speeding fast,
Where loud the waters boom.

The signal lights are shining bright,
All set for the main they gleam,
Then on we dash in the sable night,
While all our loved ones dream.

The B. L. E. and the B. L. F.

I desire to call attention to the following article which appears in the February number of the Engineer's Journal with the title "B. of L. E. vs. B. of L. F.," and which was written by a correspondent evidently friendly to the B. of L. F.:

"An important question arises from the fact that so many of our members remain members of the B. of L. F. I want to be correctly understood that I know that the B. of L. F. is a good and noble order, but I claim that when an engineer has run one year he is no longer a fireman and has no right to remain in the B. of L. F., and should withdraw and join the B. of L. E.

at once.

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schedule, for which the engineers have paid and worked for. If you remain in the B. of L. F. for its cheap insurance, you do not benefit the firemen's order, but you do assist their insurance; so many of you make it cheaper. Why don't you take the limit in the engineers'? If all of you When we lose a as the B. of L. F.'s. would, our insurance would get as cheap member, we can draw from no place except the firemen; and if you retain your insurance in the firemen's order, and only take out enough in the engineers' to hold your membership in that order, don't you think if you would carry more insurance in the engineers' you would place your help and money in a place where you could make us a cheaper insurance and create a larger insurance membership, thereby helping us to make our insurance cheap also?

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You are a dead member in the B. of L. schedule. They pay good money for it. F., because you are not benefited by their You say you You are relieved from it. have belonged to the firemen's a long time, and have paid in lots of money and don't want to lose it. Every month in these orders you get value received for what you pay. If you stop paying you quit getThe insurting protection or insurance. ance in both of these orders, as I underIf stand it, is given to us at actual cost. we can increase our membership in our insurance, we can make it cheaper. Now, Brother, if you don't stay in it and take out our insurance, how are we to increase our membership and cheapen it? who remain in the firemen's are carrying your insurance in the firemen's, and getting your protection and bread and meat from the B. of L. E.

You

The B. of L. F. is a good order for firemen. You are an engineer, and have no business to be hanging onto some other order for cheap insurance, and you alone are the cause of our insurance being higher. Buy your insurance at the same place you get your protection, wages and overtime. I consider you a deadhead in the firemen's order, and if I lose my position as an engineer and have to go firing again, I will withdraw from the B. of L. E. and join the B. of L. F.. I would place my money and membership where I got my protection and bread. Put me on record right now, if I do go into the B. of L. F. again I will be a fireman, and all you deadhead engineers who are in the B. of L. F. for cheap insurance will get charges preferred against you for not being fireI do not wish to be understood as intending to run down any order, but I feel that you ought to place your insurance membership in the order that helps you most or the one that covers your present position."

men.

The writer of the article quoted is a liberal man; far more so than the average, but he objects to a member of the

B. of L. E. retaining his membership in the B. of L. F., because the member takes out the least insurance permissible in the B. of L. E. and the greatest amount that he can get in the B. of L. F. From this it seems that the only differences between the two labor organizations is competition between their insurance departments. But this is not the only contention.

"Patriotism" is presumably a noble characteristic. The man who will do and die for his country is immortalized in the hearts of his people. A question of national morality, right or justice is not debatable with a patriot, for what his King or President does is always right, and a patriot makes no distinction between his country and his country's ruler. As some men can not distinguish colors those who are intensely patriotic seem to have lost the sense that distinguish right from wrong in national matters. With the patriot everything that his country does is right, and everything that other nations do in opposition is wrong. The soldiers, who, at the behest of George III, left their bones beyond the sea and setting sun, were patriots brave and true. As patriots they never questioned the wisdom or justice of the cause for which they died. The colonist who gave his life for secession from his mother country, and whose love for the colonies was only exceeded in intensity by his hatred of the King, was an ideal patriot. A patriotic duty that devolved upon every patriotic son of the South was to uphold slavery. In all history never a city was put to the sword except by patriots. There was never a crime dictated by a King that was not glorified by patriots.

This "patriotic" instinct is the ferment that breeds discord between labor organizations, if we may apply the same term to the same mental characteristic wherever found. As the interests of nations sometimes conflict so does the jurisdiction of kindred labor union sometimes cause disputes, and in such rivalry we find few on either side whose "patriotism" will permit them to recognize wrong in their own organization or right in the claims of their opponents. Each knows that his organization is right in all it does, or ever has done, and he resents opposition from whatever source. These "patriotic" warfares between trade unions have been the subject of most deliberations at past conventions of the American Federation of Labor. If those members that have dictated the policy of the B. of L. E. had been less "patriotic" and more condescending an alliance with the B. of L. F.

would have been formed years ago that would have prevented all friction between these two organizations.

The B. of L. E. has been one of the most potent of all labor unions in the improvement of the industrial conditions that affect working people, and when members of that union boast of the benefits that have accrued to locomotive engineers through association therewith they have well-founded grounds for their pride. When members of the B. of L. E. protest that all locomotive engineers should affiliate with that organization they are voicing a sentiment expressed by all workingmen for their respective trade unions.

Shortly after the locomotive engineers instituted the B. of L. E. the locomotive firemen, profiting by their example, also organized a trade union. When we consider that the whole world competes with locomotive firemen in their work, and that the presumed "skill" of locomotive engineers largely protects them, it may be said that the B. of L. F. has done more for the craft it represents than the B. of L. E. has done for its members. Members of the B. of L. F. justly pride themselves upon the potency of their organization. With justice they demand that every locomotive fireman affiliate with the B. of L. F., and assist in forwarding the work that is beneficial to all locomotive firemen.

In all of the industrial field there are no two vocations which are nearer akin than the firing and the running of locomotives. If there ever were two trades that should have been represented by one union it is the firing and the running of locomotives. While but few locomotive firemen have filled positions of locomotive engineers, there are few who could not do so with credit to themselves and to their employers. Nearly all locomotive engineers have been locomotive firemen; in fact, are qualified firemen, unless because of a lack of physical ability. A majority of the locomotive firemen of today are far more capable of running engines than were a majority of the engineers a few years ago. It has not been so many years since locomotive engineers were "made" from firemen of one or two years' experience, if they exhibited especial talent, while locomotive firemen of today as a rule have had many years of experience, and are possessed of technical knowledge and training of which engineers of the old school knew nothing.

Taking all of these matters into consideration is it not strange the B. of L. E.