Report of Missouri Farmers' Week. 95 



ADDRESS. 



(Hon. Fred T. Munson, Osceola, Member Board of Agriculture.) 



I have long been dissatisfied with the usual formal manner in 

 which one is supposed to address an audience. "Fel- 

 low citizens" has a sonorous sound and is a fine, 

 mouth-filling phrase, but there may be men in the 

 audience who are from New Jersey — or some 

 other foreign country — and hence it would be 

 inappropriate. 



"Ladies and gentlemen" sounds all right, but 

 suppose there are men in the audience who are 

 F. T. Munson. not gentlemen — they might be offended. 



Now, there are certain salutations which are appropriate for 

 given occasions. For instance, if a minister wishes to address his 

 flock, it would be all right for him to say, "Brethren and sisters," 

 but would it not be better for him to say "Fellow sinners?" 



Suppose a Republican wished to talk to an audience of Re- 

 publicans — it would be perfectly proper, under ordinary circum- 

 stances, for him to say "Fellow Republicans," but they are so 

 scarce this year that the phrase would be meaningless; why, I am 

 told that in California and the Dakotas they are trapping them and 

 putting them in museums as curiosities — and I am a Republican. 



"Fellow Democrats" sounds well, but did you ever notice that 

 the orator always hangs his head, as if he was just a little ashamed 

 of himself when he says it, and then he does not know this year 

 whether he is talking to Reactionary Democrats, Progressive Demo- 

 crats, or just common Democrats who have inherited their politics. 

 A Socialist should always address his audience as "Fellow 

 sufferers," for that will be their condition by the time he gets 

 through with them. 



If a suffragette is to address a bevy of "suffragettes" it will 

 not be necessary for her to make a formal introductory address. 

 She will have plenty to say without that — being a woman. 



But when I am talking to a cosmopolitan audience like this, 

 made up of all grades of society — bankers, capitalists, investors 

 and money grubbers ; then, on a plane a little higher than they, the 

 men who mold public opinion, the newspaper men and correspond- 

 ents, and others in like position; then, still above them in the scale 

 of usefulness, the ministers of the gospel, and in the same rank 

 these devoted men, presidents, deans, professors and lecturers, who 



