One who reads the testimony at the coron...

One who reads the testimony at the coroner's inquest held over the body of T. C. Wilson, the fireraan, who was killed near Emory, cannot but ask himself if it pays to employ unskilled labor to do the work of skilled men. The Ann Arbor road may deem itself victorious in its recent contest with its men, but it begins to look as if ,it might prove, after all, a dear victory. The efficiency of our fire department is again demonstrated by the fact that last year, with 37 fire alarms, the total fire loss in this city for the year was $1,704.25. The insurance companies paid $1,605.25. The property which caught fire was insured for over $80,000, so that the insurance companies owe much to the efficiency of our department. This efficiency ought to lower the rates of insurance. When the Argus wrote 634 as the democrat majority in Washtenaw county, he thought first to put the figures in caps, but on second thought concluded that the bigger figures would only make the majority look the less, and so didn't do it. The actual majority almost broke his heart. - Ypsilantian. This is a sample of the way the Republicans gloat over the election in Washtenaw this spring. It should teach Democrats who fall into Re. publican pitfalls that they ara simply making the Republicans happy. Now is the time for Democrats to get together, put their shoulders to the wheel all together and with a strong push doublé up this spring's majority and put the laugh on the other side of the Ypsilantian's face. Mayor Thompson's .annual message is a well written document, showing a comprehensive and accurate grasp of the situation of municipal affairs in this city. It is a message which can bring little comfort to cranks or crankism. It exhibits little sympathy with those who have sought to decry the good government of Ann Arbor and so to blacken her fair fame, simply to make party capital or to bring their pet theories into greater prominence. The mayor's message, which will be found on our eighth page, clearly disposes of the plea that the mayor has any right to proceed upon the theory that the law requires drastic measures to stamp out the saloon business. The law treats the business as a legitímate one. It allows it to be run, under certain restrictions, as free as any other business. These restrictions are imposed as pólice regulations for the prevention of crime and the elevation of moráis. A mayor is not calied upon to deal with the theory that liquor selling is wrong. Nowhere does the law so look upon it. The mayor's message puts him in line with his predecessors in the mayor's chair, in the judicious maintenance of law and order, not by a system of harsh and drastic measures and a wholesale denunciation of saloonkeepers, but by a firm and dignified maintenance of the laws upon the statute books of the state. In this he should be upheld by every good citizen. With only one recommendation in the message do we differ. There seems to us little need of a multiplication of the boards of the city. A board of sewer commissioners seems unnecessary, when we have a board of public works designed to take charge of just such public works as sewers.