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the type-stick are kindred implements. If the claim of Mr. Smith be true, why does not his beloved National choose eminent master printers for Laureate Judges in Poetry?
When Victor L. Basinet's new paper, The Rebel, whall appear, the amateur public will have an opportunity to behold the workings of a very extraordinary mind. Mr. Basinet is in some respects a true genius, blessed with an almost instinctive perception of the delicate and the artistic, and possessing a rhetorical style of remarkable vigour. But superadded to these qualities is such a strange point of view on social problems and systems, that the rational reader will stand aghast at the thoughts revealed. How Mr. Basinet became successively a socialist and a confessed anarchist is more than the Conservative can say, though he has met the gentleman personally. Utter disregard of the fundamental failings of humanity seems to be the keynote, however, since this dreamer refuses to believe that mankind cannot live forever in brotherhood under the Golden Rule, once that happy state of affairs is established. But his own arguments ought to correct his beliefs. He tells us that capitalists should be dethroned, since they abuse their privileges and oppress their brothers, etc., etc. But, he adds, all men are equal. Then how can he say that his proposed earth-wide brotherhood will not be marred with strife more hideous and universal than any yet known? It is all in the education, he says. But are not his hated capitalists taught the Golden Rule also? The world would like to live just as Mr. Basinet would have it, but fortunately most of us are conservative enough not to tear down our present system of society when we know of no better one to supersede it.
Another amateur whom the Conservative has met several times in person is Mr. John T. Dunn, the Irish Patriot. Mr. Dunn is a man of undoubted talent, being now editor of The Providence Amateur, yet his anti-English views are such that they call for correction. The Conservative has no particular antipathy toward the Green Isle and its people, yet he must protest at the rebellious, seditious and treasonable attitude which some maintain toward that stronger race which governs them. England has admittedly been neglectful of Ireland's interests in the past, but that such old scores should be transmitted to the present well-treated generation of Irish and Irish-Americans is anomalous. Through Britannia will come Hibernia's greatest days of glory, yet an ungrateful, revengeful few will do their best to obstruct progress, bite the hand that feeds them, and calumniate the loyal Irish People who are faithful to England. Ireland is now an equal and integral part of the British Empire, and he who slanders that Empire indirectly slanders Ould Oireland herself.
