facts and figures, story, poetry
and appeal will suffice to make this volume attractive and helpful to
those who read it, and thus the lives of many may be made brighter and
better by the life work of the author.

George W. Bain.

POPULAR LECTURES.

Index.

Lecture Page

I. Among The Masses, or Traits of Character 9

II. A Searchlight of the Twentieth Century 59

III. Our Country, Our Homes and Our Duty 101

IV. The New Woman and The Old Man 137

V. The Safe Side of Life for Young Men 187

VI. Platform Experiences 233

VII. The Defeat of The Nation's Dragon 273

VIII. If I Could Live Life Over 307

I

AMONG THE MASSES, OR TRAITS OF CHARACTER.

Whatever criticism I choose to make on human character, I hope to
soften the criticism with the "milk of human kindness." As rude rough
rocks on mountain peaks wear button-hole bouquets so there are
intervening traits in the rudest human character, which, if the clouds
could only part, would show out in redeeming beauty.

To begin with, I believe prejudice to be one of the most unreasonable
traits in character. It is said: "One of the most difficult things in
science is to invent a lense that will not distort the object it
reflects; the least deviation in the lines of the mirror will destroy
the beauty of a star." How unreliable then must be the distorting
lense of human prejudice.

I had a bit of experience during the Civil War which gave me something
of that whole-heartedness necessary to the service of my kind. In the
twilight of a summer evening, making a sharp curve in a road, about a
dozen men confronted me. They were dressed in blue, a color I was not
very partial to at that time. I had read that "he that fights and runs
away may live to fight another day." It occurred to me that he who
would run without fighting might have a still better chance, but the
click of gun locks and an order to surrender changed my mind to
"safety first" and I was a prisoner of the blue-coated cavalry.

The commanding officer who had me in charge (during my visit) was a
Kentucky Colonel. He afterward became a major-general. I looked at him
during the remainder of the war from the narrow standpoint of
prejudice and