would have been a graceful act; on the other hand, Lord Roberts probably holds that a severe and striking lesson is needed to prevent some Boers from engaging in secret conspiracies and violating the oaths they have taken to abstain from hostility.

Mr. Bryan to the Populists

Mr. Bryan's address at Topeka last week accepting the nomination of the Populists took up all the issues upon which the Democrats and Populists are united, and emphasized their number. The silver issue was presented first, but not given the first importance. Mr. Bryan tacitly admitted that the need of the remonetization of silver to increase the currency is not at present so great as it was four years ago. His most characteristic sentence on this subject was as follows: "If an increase in the volume of the currency since 1896, although unpromised by the Republicans, and unexpected, has brought improvement in industrial conditions, this improvement, instead of answering the arguments put forth in favor of bimetallism, only confirms the contention of those who insisted that more money would make better times." There' was no discussion of the question of ratio, but instead there was a sharp attack upon the Republican party for its alleged abandonment of bimetallism and readiness to retire the greenbacks and give over the issuing of paper money to the banks. Turning to other questions, Mr. Bryan gave a few words each to the income tax, the abridgment of "government by injunction," the more frequent resort to direct legislation, the enlargement of the powers of the Inter-State Commerce Commission, the creation of a Department of Labor with a Cabinet representative, and the direct election of United States Senators. To the trusts a good deal of space was given, Mr. Bryan urging that there was no inconsistency between the Democratic and Populist demand for an increase in the currency to raise prices in all industries, and their opposition to the trusts, which raise prices in certain industries at the expense of others. The issue presented last, however, was declared to be the first in importance. The colonial policy of the Administration was alleged to involve not only the quad

rupling of the standing army, the increased taxation of the masses, and the diverting of public attention from domestic reforms to foreign entanglements, but also the repudiation of the basic principle of democracy, and loss of America's influence on the side of popular government throughout the world. "When such an issue is raised," said Mr. Bryan, "there can be only two parties-the party, whatever its name be, which believes in a republic, and a party, whatever its name, which believes in an empire; and the influence of every citizen is, consciously or unconsciously, intentionally or unintentionally, thrown upon one side or the other." This came very near being a call for a realignment of voters upon an issue which did not exist when the Populist party was organized. Whether or not it will seriously divide the party cannot now be determined. With a close approach to unanimity (92 to 3), the Populist National Committee has accepted Mr. Stevenson as its Vice-Presidential candidate.

Minor Political News

During the past fortnight each of the National Committees has been giving out lists of prominent men who have changed their party allegiance because of the new issues of the pending campaign. The list of accessions to the Republican party consists largely of Silver Republicans from the mining States, and includes Senator Stewart, of Nevada, ex-Senator Mantle, of Montana, and six of the eight Colorado delegates who bolted from the Republican National Convention in 1896. Senator Teller and Mr. Williams, the negro delegate, are the only two members of the bolting delegation from Colorado. who remain in the Silver Republican party. The Democratic list, with the exception of John J. Valentine, of San Francisco, the President of the WellsFargo Express Company, consists almost entirely of men from the Central and Eastern States. The most prominent names are those of Senator Wellington, of Maryland, ex-Secretary Schurz, of New York, and ex-Secretary Boutwell, of Massachusetts. Several men in the Democratic list have as yet gone no further than to state that they will oppose President McKinley, leaving their support of Mr. Bryan to be inferred. Of the State Conventions last

week the most important, perhaps, was that of the Union or Addicks Republicans in Delaware; they indorsed the electoral ticket of the Regulars and empowered the management of the faction to effect a fusion with the Regulars upon the candidates for other offices. In Wisconsin the Democrats adopted a platform condemning the present caucus system of nominations, and virtually indorsing the system of direct primaries which the Republican candidate for Governor, Mr. La Follette, has for years championed. The Democratic platform also demanded a revision of the tax laws by which all property within the State, whether corporate or individual, should be taxed equitably and without discrimination. This also is a reform which Mr. La Follette has championed, so that the campaign must be fought entirely upon National issues. The Democrats nominated for Governor Louis G. Bohmrich, a prominent German lawyer, and put the emphasis of the platform upon militarism. In New York State Mr. Odell, for several years Senator Platt's chief lieutenant, has been agreed upon as the Republican nominee for Governor. In the Democratic ranks ex-Senator Hill and State Chairman McGuire are fighting to secure the nomination of Comptroller Coler, while Mr. Croker and ex-Senator Murphy are fighting to prevent this nomination. If it should be made in spite of Tammany opposition, the Ramapo issue would be pushed to the front, and more split tickets would be voted than have been polled in years.

Mob Violence

The lawlessness at Akron, in Ohio, last week, like that at Urbana in the same State three years ago, and like that in New York City two weeks ago, shows that race hatred, followed by indiscriminate violence and defiance to established authority, may take the same course in the North as in the South. In the Akron case a negro who had been charged (and we judge truly charged) with an atrocious crime was promptly arrested and imprisoned. There was no reason to suspect that the full rigor of the law would not be applied, and if the law does not provide a sufficiently severe punishment for an offense it rests with the people through the Legislature to

change such law. Yet a mob of perhaps fifteen hundred people, many of them ordinarily peaceful and law-abiding citizens, attacked the Akron City Hall, which contained a jail, although they had been assured that the prisoner was not there, and the authorities had even allowed two committees of the mob to search the premises. Dynamite-sticks were thrown into the building, which was almost totally destroyed, together with one adjoining, while during the reckless and really aimless rifle-shooting two little children, a boy of eleven and a girl of four, were shot and killed. In the eye of the law and in the light of common sense these children were murdered as truly as if their deaths had been designed. They and the eighteen or twenty men who were wounded, one it is thought fatally, were the victims of that spirit of lawless vengeance so easy to arouse, so difficult to restrain even within the bounds marked out for it by its own purpose. However much human nature may be willing to excuse to passion aroused by atrocious crime and to the craving for the immediate and certain punishment of the wrong-doer, it must never be forgotten that the brutalizing effect of lynching on the community and the resulting loss of respect for law and order are permanent and permeating influences for evil.

The Convention of Negro Business Men "The National Negro Business League" held in Boston last week brought together upwards of a hundred delegates, representing over twenty different States. The members of the Convention made an excellent impression upon the representatives of the Boston press, both by their appearance and the intellectual quality of the speeches. The League was organized upon the initiative of Booker T. Washington, and his common-sense philosophy permeated most of the addresses. Had these been made at a gathering of white leaders, they might justly be condemned as materialistic. Indeed, one of them, glorifying the "almighty dollar " as the "new king that has been born," should be so condemned. But in the main the emphasis put upon the acquiring of property sprang from the desire to lift up the manhood of the

negro race; for there is a moral difference between the advocacy of money-getting to secure independence and the advocacy of money-getting to secure power. Economic independence is to-day as much needed for the further advancement of the negro race as was emancipation from slavery for the advance which the present generation has witnessed. Even so uncompromising an opponent of materialism as Mr. William Lloyd Garrison recognized this and emphasized it in his address to the Convention: "The particular word I wish to leave with you," he said, "is this: Aim to be your own employers as speedily as possible. If you are farmers, do not rest until you control the land from which you gain your living. If you are mechanics or traders, seek first to own a home without a mortgage, foregoing many desirable things until you are free from debt. Independence and debt. cannot long keep company. But, in the South, as in the North, possession of honestly earned property will surely bring respect and increase personal security." Among the negro speakers were several men who have been remarkably successful-among others, a slave of Jefferson Davis, who is now Mayor of his little town in Mississippi. The speeches of some of these men telling of their early struggles were full of encouragement to negroes everywhere. The fact that some negroes have succeeded in business, as well as the fact that some have succeeded in literature and art, forces all men to distinguish between negroes and negroes, and opens the door of opportunity to all negroes who aspire.

necting the original City of London with the West End has been opened to the public, and the claims of its friends have been abundantly fulfilled. The London correspondent of the New York "Evening Post" describes in the following language the contrast between the new system and the old: "The old underground," he says, " may be counted the dismalest place out of Tophet. You approach it by murky, grimy, and sulphurous stations; your third-class compartment is little better than a horse-box, and usually carries twice the number of persons it is intended to accommodate. Your second class is practically the third class with a piece of carpet on the seat, and your first class does not rival in comfort the third class of the great lines. The traveling is through stuffy tunnels, and detestably slow. The new underground is in no sense a rival. The stations will bear looking upon, being architecturally pleasing to the eye.

The interiors are lined with white tile, and there are lifts (elevators) to take one down to the platform. As for the trains, they are a revelation. There is but one class, and that is first. The seats are armed chairs, so that there can be no overcrowding. The trains are lighted and driven by electricity. The fare is 'tuppence' for any distance, and as the railway is built on the tubular system, the cockney has already dubbed it the Tuppenny Tube.'" The great success of this new line in London, following the success of the short subway in Boston, ought to dissipate all doubt as to the future of the underground system which the city of New York has set about to construct. According to the view of Mr. Charles Stewart Smith, of the New York

Rapid Transit Commission, who is now in London, the New York system will be as attractive as that of London, and far

more rapid. Mr. Smith's statement respecting speed, as cabled to the Associated

Press, is as follows:

The distance from the Bank of England to Shepherd's Bush is 400 yards short of six including thirteen stops. This is done by miles. This is covered in twenty-five minutes, means of two single-track tubes, which, of course, prevents the running of express trains. The New York line will contain four tracks, and express trains will run from the City Hall to the northernmost end of the island [twelve miles] in from eighteen to nineteen minutes.

have been during the past year nine or ten American teachers, and forty more American teachers are scattered through the public schools of the island. Although these public-school teachers are not neces

sarily agents of religion in general and of Protestantism in particular, they have exercised a silent, perhaps, but in many cases an equally great religious influence with that of the missionaries themselves. The educational influence which has been introduced into the island during the past year must have a singularly far-reaching effect. Of the million inhabitants of Porto Rico, only one-tenth can read or write, and no less than eighty-five per cent. of the adult population is illiterate. The public and private schools so far established in Porto Rico can accommodate but thirty thousand of the two hundred thou sand children from five to sixteen years of age. For educational purposes Porto Rico is divided into fourteen districts, each with an American supervisor in charge of from thirty to forty schools. These supervisors are obliged to journey continually, riding horseback over poor roads and poorer mountain-trails in their inspection of the schools and of the native teachers. All reports from the island indicate that the children there are showing themselves as bright as American children, so far as perception and memory are concerned. They prove weak in the department of mathematics, however, and they do not seem to be naturally good reasoners or thinkers; but they are anxious to come to school, and will sacrifice much to get sufficient wearing apparel to make as good an appearance as other children. Before and after school children may be seen roaming the streets barefooted and ragged and dirty, but all reports indicate that they do not come to school in this condition; they save their shoes and their clothes for school, and are seen there usually fairly clean and fairly well dressed. Our teachers also report interesting indications of a tropical temper. The children show little power of self-control. They are very sensitive, they are easily offended, and their lack of will-power and perseverance is pathetic; on the other hand, they are instantly grateful for any service rendered, and the teachers report

that never in the United States have they received so many little tokens of appreciation and respect.

The Census Returns

The census reports

given out last week

fully establish our generalization that the population of our cities has increased less rapidly during the past decade than during the decade preceding. The returns for the principal cities thus far published are as follows:

Columbus, O....

125,560

88,150 42

71

Omaha..

102,555 140,425 -27 360

New York is the only one of the great cities which is reported to have increased more rapidly in population than during the preceding decade, and this report only recalls the belief in scientific circles ten years ago that the census of 1890 understated its population. It is very easy, in a great city with a large floating population and a still larger population of recent immigrants in overcrowded tenements, to omit from the rolls thousands who should be counted, and New York probably suffered in that way in 1890. It is not, however, so easy to account for the overenumeration which seems to have taken place in Omaha in 1890. Even if all the transients were counted and the hotel records copied for months back, it is difficult to understand how the enumerators in 1890 found 140,000 people where today there are only 102,000. The people of Omaha were not sensible of a decline in population, the Omaha "Bee" of August 22 anticipating that the new census would show an increase of over twenty thousand. The new figures, however, must be accepted as accurate, for no census bureau would report that a city had lost

forty thousand people uniess it was prepared to support its statement. The peo

ple of Omaha probably wish that the preceding census had not given them such an exalted pre-eminence in the matter of rapid growth. Their actual gain in twenty years from 30,000 to 102,000--is something to boast of, but the reported loss of forty thousand in one decade will compel real estate men to explain.

Offensive Advertisements

Americans who have followed the campaign of "Scapa," the English society against advertising disfigurement, will be interested in the news of another minor victory. Following its vote prohibiting flashlight advertisements where they "cause danger to traffic "-noted in a recent issue of The Outlook-the London County Council has voted also to prohibit transparent advertisements upon the windows of its own (the municipal) tramcars. The setting of an example so greatly needed will commend itself on purely practical grounds to every American visitor to London. Perhaps in no other big city is it so difficult to disentangle the lettering of its destination from the maze of advertising announcements on a public conveyance as it is in the case of a London 'bus. Many objections were urged to the prohibition, some of them amusingly puerile. For instance, it was contended that London streets are so ugly that people having occasion to ride through them do not wish to see any more of them than is absolutely necessary. Thus the transparent advertisement upon the street-car window was a relief by what it shut out, a blessing in disguise. More seriously, it was urged that these advertisements brought in an income of £1,500 a year, which the Council was not justified in sacrificing to gratify an æsthetic "fad." To this a conclusive practical answer was made. It has been found on actual trial that wherever the æsthetic taste of passengers has been considered, the popularity of the cars was increased, as shown by the increase of patronage. This has been the experience of Glasgow, Oldham, Blackburn, Hull, Liverpool, Bolton, and Halifaxfacts which have convinced Sheffield, whose corporation recently voted to allow

no advertisements on its new cars. The London County Council has now gone, probably, as far as it can in the matter of regulating offensive advertisements until it has obtained special powers from Parliament similar to those obtained by Edinburgh. Application may be made for a private act giving the Council power of control. Its æsthetic activity was recently stimulated by the presentation of a protest, signed by more than three hundred London architects, against the growing fashion of disfiguring buildings with monstrous letters and other devices. In this connection it may be interesting to add, as some attention has been called to the matter apropos of the Paris Exposition, that in France no advertisements can be put on public property without a license, and that all exposed advertisements are subject to a small tax. An American who has just returned from a year's residence in rural France, during which he traveled extensively in the provinces, gives this testimony: "There is in France no such outrageous disfigurement of beautiful scenery for advertising purposes as one finds here at home. Such advertising is confined to the line of the railways, and is much more noticeable as one approaches the city of Paris."

The Northfield Conference

Mr.

The three weeks' sessions closed August 20 with allday meetings in the interest of missions, foreign, home, and city. The English preachers have gone home, and Mr. Sankey has sailed to meet a long list of appointments in Great Britain. William R. Moody, as successor to his father in the chairmanship of the Conference, has fully justified his father's wisdom in committing to him that position and overruling his natural hesitancy in accepting it. The attractiveness of the young people's meetings has secured them a permanent place in the Conference programme. Of special interest are the statements made of the Christian Endeavor work in prisons. Twenty-five Christian Endeavor societies now exist among prisoners in eleven States. In the State prison of Kentucky the Christian Endeavor Society reports 400 members among a total of 1,300 convicts. The reports of prison chaplairs set high value