took the baby away with him for spite, or because he thought he'd get some money for it from the grandfather. But he died down South somewhere from the fever, and she was led to think that the child was dead as well. Then her father died, leavin' her all his money, and after she had traveled all over the world she heard that her child was alive and had been taken by some one connected with a circus. She advertised for the little girl, and put detectives on the track, and finally found the little one herself. Oh, yes, the child got over the accident. She is well and strong now, and her mother is the happiest woman you ever saw.”

Never too Late to Mend.

BY GUY R. EDSON.

"Never too late to mend" has been worked, along with other trite commonaces, until, generally speaking, it no longer possesses any direct sense or meaning. But if the quotation be slightly altered to something like "Never too late to win success,' ," it is beautifully ap propriate to the story of Brown. name isn't Brown, but it might have been if it hadn't been something altogether different, and, as he needs a name, and Brown is delightfully simple and vague, Brown it shall be.

His

Up to four years ago Brown was a horrible example of a misspent life. He had betaken himself to the ways of the bum. He worked occasionally, just enough to enable him to have some excuse for laying off whenever he felt like it. But when he did work he was always paid for it, and money in the hands of Brown spelled ruin. He should have worked regularly, for he was an expert pressman, and his services were much in de

and at a good rate of salary. But until he was forty years old Brown had vague ideas of his duty toward himself and his family. Then, when people were calling him a wreck, he suddenly braced up and "made a man of himself." He is now foreman of a printing shop, and he works regularly. His career proves the truth of the never too late theory conclusively.

Brown came to Chicago from a neighboring state while still in his teens. He had a good common school and high school education. In the small town where he originated he had worked as printer's devil on the weekly paper, so when he came to the city he sought employment where this experience would be most likely to be of service to him. He secured work in a printing shop. Here he learned the pressman's trade complete, and other things. Up to the time when he reached his twenty-fourth year Brown

was a fairly steady worker. Drink had always had some attraction for him, and his career suffered some from the beginning because of this, but he was not a "booze fighter" until he was about twenty-four.

Then-and he was married and had two children-he began to look across the bar when it was doing business with altogether too great a frequency. He went on sprees that lasted for days. He came to his work more than half intoxicated on several different occasions. Generally he showed that he was not a man to be trusted in any position of importance. So his employers, who had seriously considered making him foreman of their present room, suddenly let him know that he must reform or suffer discharge. Apparently he couldn't reform, for a few weeks later found him walking the streets looking for work.

The sight of his family suffering actual want because of his faults apparently sobered Brown to some extent. He stopped drinking, secured employment in another shop, and swore that his days of foolishness were over. Brown wasn't what could be called a hard drinker. He was not a victim of the drink habit. He didn't drink because he needed a drink, but the conviviality of his companions was irresistible to him. He was weak, so he got drunk frequently.

He held the second position for something like two years. He never made any progress there, for his habits continually prevented him from being regarded as a valuable employee. His work was in every way satisfactory, when he worked, but he was dreadfully irregular. Employers have little use for irregular workmen. They need dependability rather than brilliancy in the conduct of their business, so Brown did not go far up the road of success as he grew older.

Instead he went back, for his habits grew stronger on him each year. His employers could never depend absolutely upon his being at work any morning. He averaged, possibly, five days' regular work a week. At the end of two years he was let out, and he was told the why and the wherefore in no uncertain terms.

"You'd be a good man, Brown, if you'd brace up," the boss told him, as he was discharging him, "but you're not worth a cent the way you're going now."

Brown became worthless after his second discharge. He concluded that the easiest way to get rid of his troubles was to drown them, and he decided upon whisky as the liquid to do the drowning.

But troubles are many-lived when one tries to submerge them, and Brown found that they always came back the morning after. There was a whole year then that

he worked but little. So soon as he found employment he was discharged, so what was the use of looking for work.

Then came another spasm of reform. His wife pleaded with him to brace up, and Brown, for he was not a bad fellow at heart, only weak, promised to make a new start. He did not swear off drinking, but he swore to begin working regularly as other men and to do his best to win some kind of a success. He easily found enough work, but he just as easily lost it. Habits which have been years in forming are not to be discarded in a moment, and Brown was still careless. He went from one job to another, never staying in one place long enough to prove that he was of any real worth.

He made several brilliant starts toward

Finally one of his old employers heard of his plight during one of his periods of reformation. He sent for him and listened to his new plans. So impressed was he by Brown's earnestness that he again took him on the pay roll. He gave him some good advice and let him know that a few more years of the life he was leading would place him entirely without the pale of decency.

Brown went to work with the determination to stick to his place until he had won some kind of success. He lasted less than a year. Old friends found him

out and with them came the call of the old habits, and it was the same thing over again as it had been so many times before. When he was discharged this time his benefactor spoke to him harshly.

a hard working career, and once or twice he lost his position only after having risen to where a promotion would have been a question of only a few months. But always he managed to fall down and lose when victory was nearest. The man was perilously near to what must be called a wreck at this time of his life. He made resolves nobly, and then weakly went and broke them. He swore by all that he revered that dissipations or irregularities of any nature no longer should hold him a slave, and that from now on he would "attend strictly to business." But it never did any good, and Brown was not much better than the helpless, unnerved, will-lacking bum of the streets.

"Brown, you're no maa; you couldn't amount to anything if you wanted to," he said. "You haven't got the backbone to stick to your promise for a week. You'll keep on getting lower and lower, and the first thing you know you'll be a professional bum and your family will be without support of any kind. You're no good. Don't let me see you around the shop again."

That was four years ago. Brown took the rough words to heart and went home to think over them. He wondered if it were true that he was no man. He wondered if he didn't have the backbone to keep a promise for a week. He wondered if he really was going to become a pro

fessional bum and his family suffer want because of him. All these things he thought over after his last discharge. Then he set his lips in a firm, straight line that is seldom seen in men who fail, and went out to seek employment in a new shop where he would be unknown.

The writer met Brown a month ago, and he was then foreman of the pressroom. He had been working steadily for four years and had made himself invaluable to his employers. He had saved money, and there was no doubt that he is a real success in his line. The man who discharged him the last time was wrong; Brown did have a will and a backbone, but it took him a long time to find it. However, this helps along considerably the argument that it is never too late to succeed.—Plain Dealer.

Parry and Parryism.

The Wall Street Journal which occasionally says some sharp things to organized labor, and is not particularly friendly to it, in fact takes an independent position, and hits what it thinks amiss in economic life, severely punctures Parryism in the following:

The less interference with economic law the better. More freedom of trade, less tariff restrictions; more competition, less monopoly; more liberty, less legislation and governmental interference-those are ideals to strive for and work towards. But we are always in danger of going to an extreme in the advocacy of any principle. Freedom is so desirable that we must have it at any cost, but too much freedom means anarchy. Law is essential to public order and justice, but too much law becomes tyranny. The highest human happiness lies somewhere between the two extremes of tyranny and anarchy. Mr. Parry pleads for industrial freedom. To that we say "Amen." But too much

industrial freedom would lead to industrial anarchy.

Order and justice must rule in our industrial relations. The danger is that measures taken to secure order and justice may lead to industrial tyranny. Somewhere between monopoly and unrestricted competition lies the point of highest "economic" efficiency and national prosperity.

But the thing that we would especially call attention to is that Mr. Parry in his appeal for "industrial freedom" limits that beneficent principle to labor. He wants freedom of labor. But how about freedom for capital? He is much concerned about economic law in its relation to labor, but how about economic law and capital? What is sauce

for the goose is sauce for the gander.

One of the mightiest developments now going on in the world of business is concentration of capital. We are told that concentration is a result of natural economic law, and that any interference with it would be followed by the penal. ties which always visit violation of law. This concentration, however, is working toward the wiping out or reduction of competition which is freedom. It is working for regulation of production, and maintenance of stable rates and prices, and such regulation is interference with the law of supply and demand.

What is trades unionism but another phase of concentration? May not labor copy capital? When we begin to talk about law and freedom, let us be sure that we mean law and freedom for everybody alike, both master and servant, employer and employee, capital and labor.

Incidentally we may remark that Mr. Parry is doing the cause he advocates more harm than good, and the labor unions might help themselves by contributing to Mr. Parry's campaign expenses. -Labor Journal.

An Employer's Liberality.

The following advertisement is a good example of that class of men who are fiercely clamoring for individual liberty to work for whom and for what price they please. This advertiser may not be a Parryite, but his initials spell the right thing-H. O. G. EDITOR.

Here is the ad and a reply from a well known stenographer, which bears evidence that he could earn the $3:

WANTED-A young man for office; must be an experienced stenographer and typewriter and able to correspond in English and German; salary to start, $3 per week. Address H. O. G., 711, The Ledger.

"H. O. G. Dear Sir: I beg to offer myself as an applicant for the position advertised this morning. I am a young man thirty-seven years of age. have had twenty-three years' business experience, being connected with the United States embassy at Madagascar, and feel confident if you will give me a trial I can prove my worth to you. I am not only an expert bookkeeper, proficient stenographer and typewriter, excellent telegrapher and erudite college graduate, but have several other accomplishments which may make me desirable. I am an experienced snow shoveler, a first-class peanut roaster, I have some knowledge of remov ing superfluous hair and clipping puppy dogs' ears, and have a medal for reciting 'Curfew Shall Not Ring Tonight,' am a skilled chiropodist and a practical farmer, can cook, take care of horses, crease trousers, open oysters and repair umbrellas, and am also the champion plug tobacco chewer of Pennsylvania, my spitting record being thirtyeight feet.

"Being possessed of great physical beauty, I would not only be useful but would be ornamental

as well, lending to the sacred precincts of your office that delightful charm that a Satsuma vase or a stuffed billy goat would. My beard being quite extensive and luxuriant, my face could be used for a pen wiper and feather duster.

"I can furnish high recommendations from Chauncey Depew, Jacob J. Coxey, Kaiser Wilhelm, Captain Clark, the prime minister of Dahomey, and Akhoon of Swat.

As to salary, I would feel that I was robbing the widowed and swiping sponge cake from the orphaned if I were to take advantage of your munificence by accepting the fabulous sum of $3 per week, and would be entirely willing to give my services for less, and by accepting the sum of $1.30 per week would give you an opportunity of not only increasing your donation to the church, paying your butcher and keeping your life insured, but also to found a home for indigent flypaper salesmen and endow a free bed or so in the cats' home. Really, old man, your unheard of bounty borders on the supernatural, and to the unsophisticated must appear like reckless extravagance.

"Can call any night after 10 o'clock, or can be seen Sunday morning in the loft of the church, Broad and Dock streets, where I am employed as first assistant organ blower and understudy to the janitor. Respectfully, LOUIS

Discipline of Trainmen and Block Signals.

The adoption of automatic block signals by the railroads has a very important bearing on the discipline of trainmen, as is pointed out by R. G. Kenly, trainmaster of the Lehigh Valley Railroad. In a paper presented last week before the Railway Signal Association, Mr. Kenly

says:

The first thought on this question of discipline, in connection with automatic block signals is, there is no record nor check on their observance or proper interpretation by trainmen. Compare, for instance, the non-observance of a stop indication at an isolated automatic signal, with the observance of a positive signal governing a derail switch, or even of a manual block signal where a report of its non-observance would be promptly made. Does it not occur to many of us that there is a (mentally) careless class of men, who might disregard the automatic indication, and trust to their imagination as to track conditions, who would not dare to do so where a check on their action would be indisputable.

There is another class of men who draw on their imagination as to train movements, in connection with automatic signals, and are disposed to assume rights totally at variance with good railroad practice; for instance, there is on record a case of a freight train pulling from a passing siding, following a passenger train which passed at a high rate of speed, freight engineman assumed that passenger train was miles ahead before he got under way; result, the freight train be

yond control, passed next automatic signal indicating stop and collided with passenger train. How shall we regard the action of the freight engineman? Was it ignorance, carelessness, or lack of judgment?

Again, cases are frequently noted where the caution indication is not properly observed the indication may have been noted, but there is a tendency (erroneous, it is too true), after passing two or more caution indications, for an engineman to conclude that he has gauged the speed of a preceding train, and to imagine that he can maintain this speed indefinitely, wrongly expecting that at each succeeding signal he will get a proceed and a caution indication. Many conditions are liable to get such enginemen into very serious trouble, a burst air hose, a car or engine failure, or an outlet switch or main line crossover in use by some yard crew or work train, in fact the unexpected, but possible, conditions must be guarded against, and the railroad man, in whatever capacity, responsible for passing a signal in the stop position with a proper caution indication having been displayed, cannot be too severely dealt with. Dismissal appears to be the only proper disciplino for passing a signal at stop. The result of the error should have little or no bearing in the decision.

There is another question of esprit de corps worthy of consideration, in connection with this su ject. Does the protection afforded by automatic block signals in connection with the many other safeguards introduced in the movement and handling of trains, induce carelessness and lack of initiative among the trainmen? To quote from some recent remarks of our "Strenuous Teddy:" "The vigor and effort, without which the manlier and hardier virtues wither away," give us a key to good service-we must have strenuous men, drones and laggards must be weeded out; when the withering stage begins, there are no positions in railroad operation big enough or small enough to hold such. Enormous sums have been spent by railroads in safety appliances; not the least of which by any means have been the expenditures for block signal protection; the wages, of trainmen are very good, and the service nothing like so burdensome as a decade ago-it is but reasonable, therefore, that the very best results are demanded, and discipline should be administered with these facts in mind. This opens the way to a discussion of what is Discipline.

Discipline, in the opinion of 90 per cent of railroad employees, means punishment for errors, and at long intervals to a favored few, recognition of good work by credit marks in the archives which are

promptly forgotten on the later advent of misfortune. Webster says it means "correction, chastisement, punishment intended to correct errors," but if we are going to assume this is the only meaning of discipline, then the best discipline would be reckoned by the number and severity of the sentences inflicted on erring employees, and the best disciplinarian would be the one who could best ferret out errors, who could best tangle up some poor unfortunate, and tell him how and when and why he ought to have done exactly right (easy enough after one has had time to think and review). Does this appeal to us as good discipline? Rather let us take another 64 Webster " definition, discipline means "education, instruction and government, comprehending the communication of knowledge and the regulation of practice,' and tell me, do we not all agree that here is the essence of good discipline and loyal service, does it not cover the subject in hand? It will more quickly give us best results for the outlay of money in signal installation than all the punishment that can be devised.

Punishment for errors is a necessary evil-just as necessary as it is evil. There is a class of men (as well as school boys) who simply will not be educated; most of them are pushing wheelbarrows; if one should get into railroad service, it is necessary to punish him-his family unfortunately generally suffers all the evil. To conclude, let us devote our time to education and regulation of practice, and by this interpretation of discipline, reduce to a minimum the necessary evil.Railway World.

Strike Responsibility.

Hon. W. Bourke Cockran, in a recent address on "The Conflict Between Capital and Labor," said in part:

Comparatively few strikes are due to disputes over wages. They are fixed by immutable laws. To my mind where there is a suspension of industry the employer should be held responsible. He is the captain to whom all others must look. The man in charge of an industry, no matter what it may be, who lacks the skill to deal successfully with the men employed under him, shows by his impotency that he was never fit to have been placed in charge of it. I did not say that he lacks anything in morals or honesty, but he lacks skill.

The responsibility for most of the strikes lies with our captains of industry. It is true that capitalists realize in a general way that they and the laboring men are partners, but in the breasts of many still lingers the old prejudice imbued into

humanity in the early Roman and feudal days when labor was servile. They seem to forget that the term "service" does not apply to labor now, that there is a real partnership between the capitalist and the man who works and that together they must prosper or decline.

If we look over all these strikes we do not find that they have arisen through disputes over wages, but were due to disputes with the men whom the employer dealt with. I don't see what difference it makes whether the employer deals with A, B, Cor somebody else. Yet against that we have seen whole industries paralyzed, conditions of society threatened, because the employer would not settle with some outside person. That is no reason for causing a disruption. What concerns the employer and the laborer is what should he pay and what should he be paid. -Progress.

Only Wreck Safeguard, a Cool Head.

In discussing mechanical devices for safety of trains Mr. P. H. Houlahan, General Supt. Toledo, St. Louis & Western, said:

"You can labor from now till you are 100 years old in trying to equip railroads with every conceivable device to secure safety and yet you will have disaster unless you realize the great fundamental requirement of judgment-brains.

No invention, however efficient, will take the place of a man with a cool head, who can reason rapidly and accurately in times when lives are hanging on seconds. Block signals may become clogged and fail to work, a telegraphic order may have a doubtful meaning, a switch lamp may be turned wrong, or a hundred other things may happen that would furnish an excuse for a man to say, 'It wasn't my fault.' But going down to the bottom of railroading, you want to impress upon men who have to do the running of trains that their judgment is the real reliance; their knowledge of what to do when the emergency arises. You will notice from reading accounts of railroad wrecks last winter that some of them were on lines equipped with every known device to prevent just such accidents as happened.

"I am not one of those who believe men should be retired from active service when they have passed 40 or 45 years. It requires from 35 to 40 years to ripen some intellects into perfect judgment. The man of 40 generally has been tried by fire, and he thereafter avoids the conflagration. Like the general on the battlefield, he knows what's best to do. younger man might take his chances on a sharp curve ΟΙ over a yard full of

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