There’s a prejudice extensive ’gainst the Russian and his ways, For the ruler or his people there is very little praise; In the hurried march of progress they are badly out of date (By the way, they’ve information on this subject just of late); But with all their backward learning, yea, their sodden ignorance, In one respect the Russians lead us all a merry dance In a single branch of knowledge they can put us all to shame, They can give us every face-card and then skin us at the game. A high official undertakes a pleasant social drive And it constitutes the last time he is ever seen alive; In fact, the mere narration rather fills us with a dread, For it is his last appearance, whether in the flesh or dead. There’s a missile thrown, a loud report, and when the smoke is gone There are not sufficient fragments left to pin a medal on; There’s a gentle human drizzle, lasting frequently a day, And they hold a tweedledeum o’er the dissipated spray. To her style in execution as to neatness or dispatch, There’s no other Christian nation that can hold a decent match. HOW LONG? To the patriotically inclined, the callousness of the public conscience to reforms freely demanded by the popular welfare is indeed alarming. Consider for example the supine indifference of the country at large over the ignominious defeat in Kansas of a great moral measure to enact the ten commandments into law! And that it was accomplished in the teeth of a united support of a large, active and pious Methodist, Congregationalist and Presbyterian lobby! And who does not recall the humiliating failure of the Georgia patriot to have passed a bill to protect the long neglected interests of bull bats, turtles and other game birds hitherto and still entirely ignored by that presumably enlightened commonwealth? And while there was a low and sullen popular rumble in Tennessee against a shameless lobby of centralized bachelors that by bribes, imprecations and cajoleries smothered a _pro bono publico_ measure to tax their immunity from the strenuous life, public sentiment is once more callous and numb. As a climax in corporate effrontery, however, as well as an extreme illustration of popular lethargy, a Missouri bill to prohibit the criminal practice of tipping waiters in hotels, restaurants and cafés was ingloriously snowed under and that, too, in the face of the lynx-eyed young governor. A cunning realization by the beef trust of the impossibility of getting its unrighteous commodity before the eating public with such a regulation in vogue, is no doubt responsible for this grave popular misfortune. Hence the inquiry, what of the times when the public continues indifferent and when those who alone have the courage to essay the people’s relief from the thrall of mammon and general unrighteousness are to be derided as freaks or purchased, and nothing done about it! [Illustration]