Southern Mercury. (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 22, No. 10, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 6, 1902 Page: 3 of 16
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: Texas Digital Newspaper Program and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the UNT Libraries.
- Highlighting
- Highlighting On/Off
- Color:
- Adjust Image
- Rotate Left
- Rotate Right
- Brightness, Contrast, etc. (Experimental)
- Cropping Tool
- Download Sizes
- Preview all sizes/dimensions or...
- Download Thumbnail
- Download Small
- Download Medium
- Download Large
- High Resolution Files
- IIIF Image JSON
- IIIF Image URL
- Accessibility
- View Extracted Text
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
""i'-ir~i ir>ll I'" nil nil I TWirt
Thursday, March 6,-1902.
SOUTHERN MERCURY
f
THE PROFE88ION OF THE FAKER.
The bar boasts of its antiquity as a
profession, the physicians derive their
science from the days of Esculapius,
and the origin of the priesthood ante-
dates both law and medicine, but the
profession of the faker is the oldest
and the most enduring of all. There
are communities so peaceful that they
have no use for lawyers, regions so
healthful that doctors are unknown
there, maybe tribes so godless that
they respect no priesthood, but there
is no community, no region and no
tribe on earth, nor ever was or will
be, in which a clever faker starved to
death.
The faker relies on a weakness of
human nature which neither civiliza
tion nor education can eliminate. He
knows that men are greedy, hopeful
and credulous, and that he who promia
es much for little, new lamps for old,
or something for nothing, will not lack
business. He knows, too, that he need
not bother his brains for new ideas,
the old frauds, the old swindles and
the old tricks being always new to
some millions of his fellow men. For
example, there is a fraud known to
the police and the public as the "green-
goods game," which has been employed
for a century or two for the purpose
of cheating the unwary. It has been
described in the papers at least a
million times. It has been a stock
subject for the wit of the comic papers.
One might suppose that every human
being above the age of reason has
heard of that game. Yet when a man
remarked not long ago in the lounging
room of the principal clubs of this city
that another farmer has been caught
by the "green-goods" game," two ex-
perienced men of affairs inquired,
"What sort of a game is that?"
The industry of promoting fraudu-
lent stock companies was in a flourish-
ing condition centuries before the
South Sea bubble ruined half England.
Every once in a while a sleek promoter
decamps, leaving a horde of cheated
investors and a quantity of mortgaged
or rented office furniture, but the
gulled investors, instead of going
home and having guardians of them-
selves appointed, draw their remaining
cash from the bank and go hunting for
another promoter willing to relieve
them of it. People are so eager to be
cheated that there is a standing temp-
tation for the faker, and the swindling
guild might say, as Warren Hastings
said when accused of looting, that, con-
sidering the opportunities, they are
surprised at their own moderation.
It is so easy to rob the public with
the oublic's consent, and by entirely
legal and almost conscionable means,
that the criminal is justly regarded
as a bungler and is shut up in prison.
Crime is only an expedient for great
emergencies. When a man can fill a
bottle with soapy .water, give it a
fancy name and sell it as a cleansing
fluid with marvelous properties, or as
a sure cure for consumption, and when
he can rent fine office furniture and
sell printed paper as stock in a myth-
ical mine or oil well, why should he
elect to be a burglar or a footpad?
Really, the criminal is only another
kind of a gull.
People never will learn that men do
not wittingly give something for noth-
ing, and that when a smooth promoter
promises to pay millions for the use
of hundreds, it is well not to let him
have any money. A rule is never to
put a dollar into an enterprise without
having inquired into it thoroughly, and
never to play at another man's game.
—San Francisco Bulletin.
APPROPRIATIONS FOR TEXAS.
Speaking on the subject of river and
harbor appropriations for Texas, Rep-
resentative Ball said last week:
"After exhaustive discussion before
the committee and frequent conferenc-
es with Burton, I was unab.e to secure
an appropriation in any sum recogniz-
ing the Galveston inner harbor pro-
ject. In common with the chairman
a number of the members of the
committee were opposed to the inser-
tion of this item. They coincided with
Chairman Burton in the view that the
improvement would inure more direct-
ly to the benefit of the wharf and dock
companies fronting on the proposed
improvement than to the benefit of
commerce generally. They cited the
fact that each of the engineers did not
give unqualified endorsement to the
project until the connection was made
with Pelican Island and Pelican Spit,
and that property so filled as to make
it available for terminal and wharf fa-
cilities, or the alternative project in-
volving a dike from Texas City, was
adopted, which latter project had been
condemned in a recent report.
"I insisted that similar work had
been done in a number of harbors on
the Atlantic coast. Mr. Burton dis-
claimed responsibility therefor and
urged that improvements of interior
harbors had not been made upon the
great lakes where enormous tonnage
existed, but municipalities and corpo-
rations had been required to do their
own improvement.
"The Trinity river project was ob-
jected to at this time on account of the
fact that it had developed a great
amount of criticism and opposition in
the preceding Congress and it is Mr.
Burton who was anxious to personally
inspect the river before- entering upon
the project at all. The point of an in-
sufficient water supply for the river
and the statement of the engineer that
artificial means would have to be re-
sorted to to secure an adequate vol-
ume of water was strongly pressed. I
insisted that even to concede that
point and eliminate its consideration
by the committee would still result in
from six to eight months' navigation
upon the river, and carry out the pur-
pose of Congress in making an appro-
priation in the bill that failed of $750,-
000.
"Being burdened with a large num-
ber of projects demanding recognition
in Texas, and appreciating the embar-
rassment of my colleagues upon the
committee who had interests of their
own States to care for, and that Mr.
Burton and the members of the com-
mittee having given evidence of their
desire to make every concession they
could in recognizing the claims of Tex-
as without sacrflcing their own con-
victions, I felt it my duty looking to
the general interests of Texas, present
and prospective, and to prevent strain-
ed relations in lue committee, to re-
frain from further insistence upon the
Galveston inner harbor project, and to
accept an appropriation of $350,000 for
the Trinity river to be applied in de-
veloping from six to eight months'
navigation therein from section one,
forty-nine miles below Dallas, where
the east fork of the Trinity unites to
form an unquestioned volume of water
to the mouth of uie river, with a re-
examination of section one, to Dallas
for the purpose of determining wheth-
er a further appropriation of $400,000
upon section one, of the former survey
would result in giving the same dura-
tion of navigation from the mouth of
the east fork to Dallas.
"I have confidence that it will; and
it is the opinion shared by the gentle-
men representing Dallas. I regret be-
yond measure that the inner harbor
project at Galveston was not recog-
nized and adhere to the opinion that
it was and is in every way worthy of
recognition to the full amount which
has been urged so forcibly by Mr. Bur-
gess and Colonel Gresham and concur-
red in by the Texas delegation.
"The friends of this improvement
are in no way stopped from seeking to
secure an amendment in the Senate
adopting this project."
SANTA FE EXCURSION RATES.
Galveston.—Account Texas Bankers'
Association meeting, one and one third
fare, March 19th; limited March 23d.
Cleburne.—Account Y. M. C. A. State
Convention, one and one-third fare,
March 12th, 13th and 14th; limited to
March 18th.
Fort Worth.—Account meeting Cat-
tle Raisers' Association and Fat Stock
Show, convention rates, March 9th and
10th, and trains arriving morning of
the 11th; limited to March 14th.
Charleston, S. C.—Account Exposi-
tion, one and one-half fare; limited to
June 1; tickets on sale daily; cheaper
rates with short limit on sale Thurs-
day of each week.
W. S.KEENAN, G. P. A.
Galveston, Texas.
"DOWN BY THE RIO GRANDE"—-
The Annual Event of the Two Repub-
lics.
Yaqui, George Washington, the La*
redos.
Some years since the citizens of La-
redo and New Laredo conceived the
idea of fittingly celebrating Washing-
ton's birthday (February 22) by suit-
able "Mexican-American" fiestas and
parades, and from a small source this
has grown to a magnificent annua)
event, unsurpassed in its splendid sur-
roundings and interesting particulars
by anything of a similar nature.
International in its character, loca-
ted on the border line between the two
great republics, occurring at a season
of the year when business cares press
lightly, and at a time when weather
conditions in that locality are Ideal,
this event offers unsurpassed induce-
ments to the pleasure seeker.
This year the celebration will con-
sist of three days continuous festivi-
ties, February 21, 22 and 23, the
principal day of course being the 22d,
and the program, which is very elabor-
ate, will comprise several new and in-
teresting features, among which may
be mentioned daylight and night bull
fights (the latter by electric illumina-
tion), torchlight parades, embodying
typical Mexican and Indian features,
sham battle and capture of the city by
the Indians, naval fireworks, military
drills and display evolutions, histori-
cal pageants and trades display, flow-
er carnival, band and musical con-
tests, etc.
For this occasion low excursion
rates will be made to Laredo; also for
the benefit of those who desire to see
more of Mexican life and customs, ar-
rangements have been made for sale
of ten day excursion tickets to Mon-
terey, permitting stop-over at Laredo
in order to take in the international
celebration.
Any particular information desired
can be ascertained from your nearest
ticket agent, or by addressing D. J.
Price, G. P. & T. A., I. & G. N. R. R.,
Palestine Texas.
♦
EVERYBODY MAY GO TO CALI-
FORNIA
In order to stimulate California
travel, the Houston and Texas Central
R. R. has decided to put on extremely
low rates from all points along its
line. The rate from Austin, Dallas,
Fort Worth and Denison will be $25.00.
Tickets will be one-way, second-class,
and will be accepted on payment of
the through Pullman tourist sleeping
car rate on all Pullman Excursion
sleepers operated over the Sunset
Route. Tickets will be sold daily dur-
ing March and April and are limited
to continuous passage. This is the
chance of a lifetime to make the trip
to California. The through excursion
sleeping cars are the best of
their kind, are personally conducted
and equipped with every convenience
of travel. For further information ad-
dress local Houston and Texas Central
Agent, or, T. J. ANDERSON, A. G. P.
A., or M. L. ROBBINS, G. P. & T. A.,
Houston, Texas.
THE NEW YORK WORLD THRICG-
A-WEEK EDITION.
Time has demonstrated that the
Thrice-a-Week New York World stands
alone in its class. Other papers have
imitated its form but not its success.
This is because it tells all the news
all the time and tells It impartially,
whether that news be political or oth-
erwise. It is in fact almost a daily at
the price of a weekly and you cannot
afford to be without it.
Republican and Democrat alike can
read the Thrice-a-Week World with
absolute confidence in its truth.
In addition to news, it publishes
flrst-class serial stories and other
features suited to the home and fire-
side.
The Thrlce-a-Week World's subscripr
tion price is only $1.00 per year and
this pays for 156 papers. We offer this
unequalled newspaper and the South-
ern Mercury together one year for
$1.60. The regular subscrii
of the two papers is $2.00.
Ion price
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Matching Search Results
View one place within this issue that match your search.Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
Park, Milton. Southern Mercury. (Dallas, Tex.), Vol. 22, No. 10, Ed. 1 Thursday, March 6, 1902, newspaper, March 6, 1902; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth185940/m1/3/?q=yaqui: accessed April 26, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; .