Some Of John Burns' Talk

John Burus is saying a good many things during his triumphant tour of this country that he is being called upon to prove. In the first place he lias been trying to go Editor Stead one better in calling Chicago bad nauies. He said that the big western city was a pocket edition of the place froui which Dives held a conference with Lazurus. This didn't take with the Chicago people any better thau some of Mr. Stead's declarations in regard to Chicago's wickedness. Burns was called to account for his slanderous utterances but got out of it by telling thern that he "didn't mean anything." In the very same interview in which he qualifies his statements about Chicago, Mr. Burns gets off an epigram matic assortinent of criticisms of the institutions of this country. Among other thihgs that he said in this bunch of epigrama was a characterization of the American jail. Here John made another rnistake but one that he will not in all probability be asked to retract. He said that our jails were "too good." Now what the Euglishman needs is to run up against some American penologist. He would get a dose of penal statistics shot into him that would make him tired. He would quickly change his mind on the jail question. John has evidently been lounging around a bar room and thought that it was a jail. Someone ought to teil Mr. Burns that the American jail system is in a despicable condition, before he makes another fooi break. Seriously, however, this sort of break will greatly interiore with the oracular quality of his statements. It gives one the impression that the English labor leader is making statements on the basis of his reputation and not on the basis of facts which he ought to know, by the easiest kind of investigation. Mr. Burns is also giving out a few pointers concerning the advantages and the defects of the American constitution. What he wants to learn is to keep his mouth closed tight when he sees an American newspaper reporter approaching. Like poor Poll he will soon awake to a realizatiou of the fact that he has been talking too mach. The best thing that Burns has said yet is to declare that he will not write a book. Heaven lielp him to keep his original resolution in this respect ! Every republioan elected to Congress ihis fall sliould paste in his bat, where he can see theui every time he takes it off, the inspiring words of Toni Reed before the Home Market Club of Boston "By our wisdom, moderation, and good sense, we must so govern this country that the great questions of the next six years may have as noble a solution as the great questions of their day had at the hands of the great republicans who preservad the union, upheld the honor of the nation, and gaveJthe people thirty years of peace, prosperity, and progress." A Lamstng dispa-tch says that the. iiLauguratio.11 ceremonies at that place wlU be wry elabórate. Whose idea ift is nobody knows, but the attorneygeneral-elect, Fred A. Maynard, is poplarly supposed to havie conceived it. At all events it has been decided to inaugúrate üiauguration day at the stat capital this year and swear in the state officers with considerable eclat. AVlien Steve Masón was elected governor of Michoigan, he hunted up a notary, agreed to fo tdie square thing by tche constitution of thO United States amid oí this state, and thereupon assunied the duties of his office. So it has been with all the other goveraors and state officers ofMieliigan. Their elevation to high and respoaisible positions were never attemded by ceremoiny. But old tliings are passing away, and it has been decided to make the inauguration of the state officers this year a noteworthy evient, and a programme is now beimg arrange-d for the occasioin. It has been decided to have the state otfficers take the oath of ofidce in Rep resem tative Hall on the afternoon óf Januarj' 1. Gen Algeir ■ivill be rn-ited to preside, Chief Justice McGrath will be requested tO' deliver au addrese, and the oath of office will be admiiniistered by Clerk C. C. Hopkiins, of the Supreme Court. Jerry Simpson asserts that he will return to his Kansas farm at the end of bis term in Conaress. We imaginethat the people of the Sunflower State will tiereafter be content to let him remaiu an hurnble tiller of the soi!. Where he tan appear sockless and with shins bedaubed with grime and mud if he so desires. The latest but not, we fear, the last of the Cleveland administration's emergency bond issues is only just disposed of, and it is announced that the gold reserve of the treasury is again below the old limit of $100,000,000. Verily, the ways of a government which is a trangressor against the laws of sound policy are hard and full of trouble.