PUBLISHED IN CHICAGO _circa_ A. D. 1930, AND PRINTED BY THE PHILISTINE FROM ADVANCE SHEETS. In what Limbo, or Paradis, Hides the bulge of his brainful brow Ponderous Howells, W. D.? Where vade Warner and Aldrich now, Boyesen, knowful of why and how, Skandine skald of the soulful sneer— Light his pen as a sub-soil plow—? _But where is the froth of yestreen’s beer?_ Where now drivels the droolful Bok? Whither doth Harding Davis fare? And Riley, best of the rhyming flock? Where is the georgic Garland, where Harte, tamed cub of the grizzly bear? Ben Hur Wallace, whose style was queer? Quipful Clemens, that jester rare? _But where is the froth of yestreen’s beer?_ Where hies Hawthorne, last of the name? Gamesome Stockton, where gambols he, With lass and tiger, his fee to fame? And Bunner, airful of Arcadie? Whither doth Brander Matthews flee? Slim, sad Gilder, sweet sonneteer, Darling and pride of his Century? _But where is the froth of yestreen’s beer?_ Sought ye, gentles, a year and day Tidings of these, ye still must hear The doleful burden of this poor lay, _But where is the froth of yestreen’s beer?_ G. F. W. PHILISTINISM IN GENERAL. I doff my hat to THE PHILISTINE and hail it “Brother well met.” In the name of all who have hated shams, in the name of all brave knights whose lances have shivered against the dead walls of human stupidity, ignorance, malice and convention; in the name of every stifled and unuttered song that should have mounted like a meadow lark’s to heaven; in the name of every pilloried hope and dead ambition killed in the long battle with the Mediocrities and the Banalities greet thee, Knight Errant from Philistia, and bid thee God speed. And having,“hailed,” and “bade,” and “greeted,” let me say that though the world is wide and shams are many, and the race, to the swift usually, and the fight to the strong almost always, and though the God of battle, is according to Napoleon, whom it is fashionable to quote “on the side of the big battalions,” yet strong blows for truth are cumulative and THE PHILISTINE’S bright blade must be dyed often with the blood of Error ere it be sheathed and every lie sooner or later driven to its sure end of bankruptcy. I will not hail you Reformer, for that old and honorable name like that older and still more honorable one of “gentleman” has fallen recently into disrepute and at last reports was still falling; besides reformers are often failures, and too often after a brief career are found taking tea with the Mammon of Unrighteousness, having assumed their discarded role originally rather for “what there was in it,” than from exalted or high-minded motives or to improve the condition of their respective healths.