Show A PETITION AND A PROMISE Some time ago we received a petition from three or four thousand ladies ladies who are mothers of families requesting us not to make any mention whatever of a certain newspaper published in our city and to a small circle of readers known as the Tribune In response to the request of the delegation that waited upon us we said it was not our int ntion to in any way heed such papers as the Seiner Valley l cho and the Tribune hut that the rule was not inflexible We asked the ladies of the delegation for something more specific than the petition set forth as a reason why they desired that no mention of such papers as those above named should be made in our columns They replied that they held that the very word Tribune was immoral and that whenever the word was seen or heard in their homes it frightened the smaller children and made all the larger boys so bail that several had gone away to join Jesse James band In proof of this they cited a number instances in-stances which are familiar to all but of which the true cause was never known until now The request the petitioners was granted but today we very much regret re-gret that circumstances over which we have no control compel us to break our promise Ihe apology which we offer for so doing is the fact that yesterday this same Tribune made an uncalledfor attack at-tack upon us an attack in which they sought to and did wound us There was no justification whatsoever for piercing and wo indng us as they did for we have ever been meek and humble lowly and lovely and they wounded us from mere wantonness and from a consciousness of superabundant strength and ability They have done us a great harm and by so doing have not added one mite to their great glory We were seeking to live and they have slain us we had thought the wide world broad enough for us both but they alone have filled it and their greatness is i already fast crowding upon its confines and we must be content to be as naught In the hour of our greatest affliction we went to the assistant on whom we lean for support and told him of our trouble and sorrow and how the Tribune had injured us and said that our article of Monday last was not a specimen of far reaching and austere logic Our assistant who is a first cousin to my friend Mrs Harris bade us be of good cheer and gave us great comfort and said Your logic is as good as the Tribunes although it may not be so austere for they are given to austerity In truth austerity is their stronghold and without austerity they are nothing to take from them their austerity is to deprive them of their strength and they become as a little lit-tle child Then we complained the Tribune inferred that our jewels were only paste and we had always deemed them of the first water and finest hue tOur assistant on whom we lean for support assured us that while he was not an expert lapidary yet he knew enough to assert that the Tribune was not competent to judge as all of their crown jewels were paste for he had often examined them in their hiding place And further he said that their jewels were not even French paste but were a poor imitation of a false thing Still we were not comforted and we told our friend our assistant that the Tribune Trib-une had sought to blast our reputation and that such a thing could do them no good while it made us poor indeed To this he replied U Tut tut lad you should not care for that as next to austerity aus-terity blasting is the Tribunes favorite occupation and 1 account for this from the fact they much resemble Tobin Tob-in this that their belly is filled with the east wind Never forget my boy that the machinations of the wicked come to naught although at times lIe who orders all things for the best allows them to live and seem to triumph for a short while and they have their reward i The time has not yet come in which such as the Tribune shall be swept from the the face of the earth and so you must be patient yet a little longer We left our II assistant feeling much rejoiced and in the future when we cannot agree with the Tribune we shall not meet them in a spirit of contention but think that H a dispassionate dis-passionate kind and complete reply is I the best means of meeting such an attack at-tack and is the means we shall endeavor to use |