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Title: Winnowed Wisdom (1926)
Author: Stephen Leacock
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A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook
Title: Winnowed Wisdom (1926)
Author: Stephen Leacock
Contents
Author's Preface
I. The Outlines of Everything
Volume One--The Outline of Shakespeare
Volume Two--The Outline of Evolution
Volume Three--The Business Outline of Astronomy
Volume Four--Outline of Recent Advances in Science
II. Brotherly Love Among the Nations
The Next War
International Amenities
French Politics for Beginners
The Mother of Parliaments
New Light from New Minds
An Advance Cable Service
Back from Europe
III. Studies in the Newer Culture
A Little Study in Culture from Below Up
The Crossword Puzzle Craze
Information While You Eat
The Children's Column
Old Proverbs Made New
IV. In the Good Old Summer Time
The Merry Month of May
How We Kept Mother's Birthday
Summer Sorrows of the Super-rich
How My Wife and I Built Our Home for $4.90
The Everlasting Angler
Have We Got the Year Backwards?
Our Summer Convention
V. Travel and Movement
All Aboard for Europe
The Gasoline Goodbye
Complete Guide and History of the South
The Give and Take of Travel
VI. Great National Problems
The Laundry Problem
The Questionnaire Nuisance
This Expiring World
Are We Fascinated with Crime?
VII. Round Our City
At the Ladies Culture Club
Our Own Business Barometer
My Pink Suit
Why I Left Our Social Workers' Guild
VIII. The Christmas Ghost
The Christmas Ghost
Author's Preface
An Appeal to the Average Man
It is the especial aim of this book to make an appeal to the
average man. To do this the better, I have made a study of the
census of the United States and of the census of Canada, in order
to find out who and what the average man is.
In point of residence, it seems only logical to suppose that the
average man lives at the centre of population, in other words, in
the United States he lives at Honkville, Indiana, and in Canada at
Red Hat, Saskatchewan.
In the matter of height the average man is five feet, eight inches,
decimal four one seven, and in avoirdupois weight he represents 139
pounds, two ounces, and three pennyweights. Eight-tenths of his
head is covered with hair and his whiskers if spread over his face
could cover it to the extent of one-tenth of an inch. This ought
to be a promising sign to a reader.
The average man goes to church six times a year and has attended
Sunday School for two afternoons and can sing half a hymn.
Although it thus appears that the average man is rather weak on
religion, in point of morals the fellow is decidedly strong. He
has spent only one week of his whole life in the penitentiary.
Taking an average of theft and dividing it by the population it
appears that he has stolen only two dollars and a quarter. And he
never tells a lie except where there is some definite material
advantage.
The average man is not, by statistics, a great traveller. The poor
fellow has been only sixty-two miles away from his own home. He
owns nine-tenths of a Ford car, punctures a tire once every twenty-
two days, and spends, in the course of his whole life, a month and
a half underneath his car.
The education of the average man cost $350. But it didn't get him
far. He stopped--according to the educational statistics--within
one year of being ready for a college. Most of the things he
learned had no meaning for him. He gave up algebra without yet
knowing what it was about.
By the time I had got to this point of the investigation I began to
realize what a poor shrimp the average man is. Think of him with
his mean stature and his little chin and his Ford car and his fear
of the dark and his home in Honkville, Indiana, or Red Hat,
Saskatchewan. And think of his limited little mind! The average
man, it seems, never forms an opinion for himself. The poor nut
can't do it. He just follows the opinions of other men.
I would like ever so much to start a movement for getting above the
average. Surely if we all try hard, we can all lift ourselves up
high above the average. It looks a little difficult mathematically,
but that's nothing.
Think how fine it would be to get away from the average--to mingle
with men seven feet high and women six feet round; to consort with
people who wouldn't tell a lie except for big money, and to have
friends who could solve cross-word puzzles without having to buy
the Encyclopaedia Britannica!
But the only trouble with such a movement is that if I did really
start it, and if I could, with great labor and persuasion, get it
going and it began to succeed, then who would come flocking into it
but the darned little average man himself. As long as it was
unsuccessful, he'd keep out of it. But let it once succeed and in
he'd come. That's exactly his dirty little nature.
In short, now that I think of it I am not so keen on appealing to
the average man. Nothing ever does appeal to him, until it has
made a terrible hit somewhere else.
I had just brought my investigation to this point when I realized
that I had forgotten about the average woman. What about her?
Where does she come out?
So I picked up the census volumes again and took another little run
through them.
The average woman, it seems, does not live at Honkville, Indiana,
or at Red Hat, Saskatchewan. The percentage of women in the
population being much greater in the eastern part of the country,
the average woman lives one hundred and five miles east of the
average man. But she is getting nearer to him every day. Oh, yes,
she is after him, all right!
It is also clear that the average woman is about half an inch
taller than the average man. Women, taken individually, are no
doubt not so tall as men, but, on the average, a woman is just a
little taller. Men will find it a little difficult to understand
how this can be, but any woman can see it at once.
In point of personal appearance, it may be estimated that women,
taken as an average, wear their hair just below their shirt collar
and have their skirts, at an average, always two inches higher than
they were a year before.
The average woman gets married at twenty-seven, has two children
and a quarter, and is divorced once in every eight years.
In morals the average woman is away ahead of the man. Everybody
knows this in a general way, but it is very pleasing to see it
corroborated by cold, hard statistics.
The man as we have seen above, spends a week in the penitentiary.
But the woman is there only half a day. In her whole life she
consumes only one and a half gills of whiskey, but, on the other
hand, she eats, according to the director of the census, four tons
of candy. She is devoted to her two and a quarter children, but
she makes more fuss over the quarter of a child than she does over
the two whole ones.
In point of intellect, the average woman cannot reason and cannot
think. But she can argue. The average woman, according to the
educational section of the census, only got as far in arithmetic as
improper fractions. Those stopped her.
And yet, take her as she is--even with her hair bobbed round her
ears and her skirt higher than it was, and her inability to add or
to reason--she is all right. The average man comes out of the
investigation as a poor insignificant shrimp. But with the average
woman, the more you think about her, the better she appears.
Perhaps on second thoughts I might dedicate this book to the
average woman. But then, unfortunately, the average woman reads
nothing--or nothing except love stories.
STEPHEN LEACOCK
McGill University
1926
I
The Outlines of Everything
Designed for Busy People at Their Busiest
A Preface to the Outlines
Within recent years it is becoming clear that a university is now a
superfluous institution. College teaching is being replaced by
such excellent little manuals as the "Fireside University Series,"
the "World's Tiniest Books," the "Boys Own Comic Sections," and the
"Little Folks Spherical Trigonometry." Thanks to books such as
these no young man in any station of life need suffer from an
unsatisfied desire for learning. He can get rid of it in a day.
In the same way any business man who wishes to follow the main
currents of history, philosophy and radio-activity may do so while
changing his shirt for dinner.
The world's knowledge is thus reduced to a very short compass. But
I doubt if even now it is sufficiently concentrated. Even the
briefest outlines yet produced are too long for the modern business
man. We have to remember that the man is busy. And when not busy
he is tired. He has no time to go wading through five whole pages
of print just to find out when Greece rose and fell. It has got to
fall quicker than that if it wants to reach him. As to reading up
a long account, with diagrams, of how the protozoa differentiated
itself during the twenty million years of the pleistocene era into
the first invertebrate, the thing is out of the question. The man
hasn't got twenty million years. The whole process is too long.
We need something shorter, snappier, something that brings more
immediate results.
From this point of view I have prepared a set of Outlines of
Everything covering the whole field of science and literature.
Each section is so written as to give the busy man ENOUGH and just
exactly enough of each of the higher branches of learning. At the
moment when he has had enough, I stop. The reader can judge for
himself with what accuracy the point of complete satiety has been
calculated.
Volume One--The Outline of Shakespeare
Designed to make Research Students in Fifteen Minutes. A Ph.D.
degree granted immediately after reading it.
1. Life of Shakespeare. We do not know when Shaksper was born nor
where he was born. But he is dead.
From internal evidence taken off his works after his death we know
that he followed for a time the profession of a lawyer, a sailor
and a scrivener and he was also an actor, a bartender and an
ostler. His wide experience of men and manners was probably gained
while a bartender. (Compare: Henry V, Act V, Scene 2. "Say now,
gentlemen, what shall yours be?")
But the technical knowledge which is evident upon every page shows
also the intellectual training of a lawyer. (Compare: Macbeth,
Act VI, Scene 4. "What is there in it for me?") At the same time
we are reminded by many passages of Shakspere's intimate knowledge
of the sea. (Romeo and Juliet. Act VIII, Scene 14. "How is her
head now, nurse?")
We know, from his use of English, that Shagsper had no college
education.
His Probable Probabilities
As an actor Shicksper, according to the current legend, was of no
great talent. He is said to have acted the part of a ghost and he
also probably took parts as Enter a citizen, a Tucket sounds, a Dog
barks, or a Bell is heard within. (Note. We ourselves also have
been a Tucket, a Bell, a Dog and so forth in our college dramatics
days. Ed.)
In regard to the personality of Shakespere, or what we might call
in the language of the day Shakespere the Man, we cannot do better
than to quote the following excellent analysis done, we think, by
Professor Gilbert Murray, though we believe that Brander Matthews
helped him a little on the side.
"Shakespere was probably a genial man who probably liked his
friends and probably spent a good deal of time in probable social
intercourse. He was probably good tempered and easy going with
very likely a bad temper. We know that he drank (Compare: Titus
Andronicus, Act I, Scene I. "What is there to drink?"), but most
likely not to excess. (Compare: King Lear, Act II, Scene I.
"Stop!" and see also Macbeth, Act X, Scene 20. "Hold! Enough!")
Shakespere was probably fond of children and most likely of dogs,
but we don't know how he stood on porcupines.
"We imagine Shakespeare sitting among his cronies in Mitre Tavern,
joining in the chorus of their probable songs, and draining a
probable glass of ale, or at times falling into reverie in which
the majestic pageant of Julius Caesar passes across his brooding
mind."
To this excellent analysis we will only add. We can also imagine
him sitting anywhere else we like--that in fact is the chief charm
of Shakesperian criticism.
The one certain thing which we know about Shakespere is that in his
will he left his second best bed to his wife.
Since the death of S. his native town--either Stratford upon Avon
or somewhere else--has become a hallowed spot for the educated
tourist. It is strange to stand today in the quiet street of the
little town and to think that here Shakespeare actually lived--
either here or elsewhere--and that England's noblest bard once
mused among these willows--or others.
Works of Shakespeare
Our first mention must be of the Sonnets, written probably,
according to Professor Matthews, during Shakesbur's life and not
after his death. There is a haunting beauty about these sonnets
which prevents us from remembering what they are about. But for
the busy man of today it is enough to mention, "Drink to Me Only
With Thine Eyes," "Rock Me to Sleep Mother," "Hark, Hark the Dogs
do Bark." Oh, yes, quite enough. It will get past him every time.
The Historical Plays
Among the greatest of Shakespeare's achievements are his historical
plays,--Henry I, Henry II, Henry III, Henry IV, Henry V, Henry VI,
Henry VII and Henry VIII. It is thought that Shakespeare was
engaged on a play dealing with Henry IX when he died. It is said
to have been his opinion that having struck a good thing he had
better stay with it.
There is doubt as to authorship of part, or all, of some of these
historical plays. In the case of Henry V, for example, it is held
by the best critics that the opening scene (100 lines) was done by
Ben Jonson. Then Shakespeare wrote 200 lines (all but half a line
in the middle) which undoubtedly is Marlowe's.
Then Jonson, with a little help from Fletcher, wrote 100 lines.
After that Shakespear, Massinger and Marlowe put in 10 lines each.
But from this point the authorship is confused, each sticking in
what he could.
But we ourselves are under no misapprehension as to what is
Shakespeare's and what is not. There is a touch which we recognize
every time. When we see the real Shakespeare, we know it. Thus,
whenever it says "A Tucket Sounds, Enter Gloucester with Hoboes,"
we know that Shakespeare, and only Shakespeare, could have thought
of that. In fact Shakespeare could bring in things that were all
his own, such as:--"Enter Cambridge followed by An Axe." "Enter
Oxford followed by a Link." His lesser collaborators could never
get the same niceness of touch. Thus, when we read, "Enter the
Earl of Richmond followed by a pup," we realize that it is poor
work.
Another way in which we are able to test whether or not a
historical play is from Shakespeare's own pen is by the mode of
address used by the characters. They are made to call one another
by place designations instead of by their real names. "What says
our brother France?" or "Well, Belgium, how looks it to you?"
"Speak on, good Burgundy, our ears are yours." We ourselves have
tried to imitate this but could never quite get it; our attempt to
call our friends "Apartment B, the Grosvenor," and to say "Go to
it, the Marlborough, Top Floor No. 6" has practically ended in
failure.
The Great Tragedies
Every educated person should carry in his mind an outline idea of
the greatest of Shakespeare's tragedies. This outline when reduced
to what is actually remembered by playgoers and students is not
difficult to acquire. Sample:
Hamlet (not to be confused with Omelette which was written by
Voltaire). Hamlet, Prince of Denmark, lived among priceless
scenery and was all dressed in black velvet. He was deeply
melancholy. Either because he was mad, or because he was not,
Hamlet killed his uncle and destroyed various other people whose
names one does not recall.
The shock of this drove Ophelia to drown herself, but oddly enough
when she threw herself in the water she floated, and went down the
river singing and shouting. In the end Hamlet killed Laertes and
himself, and others leaped into his grave until it was quite full
when the play ends. People who possess this accurate recollection
rightly consider themselves superior to others.
Shakespeare and Comparative Literature
Modern scholarship has added greatly to the interest in
Shakespeare's work by investigating the sources from which he took
his plays. It appears that in practically all cases they were old
stuff already. Hamlet quite evidently can be traced to an old
Babylonian play called Humlid and this itself is perhaps only a
version of a Hindoo tragedy, The Life of William Johnson.
The play of Lear was very likely taken by S. from the old Chinese
drama of Li-Po, while Macbeth, under the skilled investigation of
modern scholars, shows distinct traces of a Scottish origin.
In effect, Shakespeare, instead of sitting down and making up a
play out of his head, appears to have rummaged among sagas, myths,
legends, archives and folk lore, much of which must have taken him
years to find.
Personal Appearance
In person Shakespeare is generally represented as having a pointed
beard and bobbed hair, with a bald forehead, large wide eyes, a
salient nose, a retreating chin and a general expression of
vacuity, verging on imbecility.
Summary
The following characteristics of Shakespeare's work should be
memorized--majesty, sublimity, grace, harmony, altitude, also
scope, range, reach, together with grasp, comprehension, force and
light, heat and power.
Conclusion: Shakespeare is a very good writer.
Volume Two--The Outline of Evolution
Specially Revised to Suit Everybody, and Particularly Adapted for
the Schools of Tennessee.
It seems that recently there has been a lot of new trouble about
the theory of evolution in the schools. Either the theory is being
taught all wrong or else there is something the matter with it.
For years it had seemed as if the doctrine of Evolution was so
universally accepted as to lose all its charm. It was running as a
close second to Spherical Trigonometry and Comparative Religion and
there was no more excitement about it than there is over
Anthropology.
Then suddenly something seems to have happened. A boy in a Kansas
public school threw down his book and said that the next time he
was called a protozoon he'd quit the class. A parent in Ostaboola,
Oklahoma, wrote to the local school board to say that for anyone to
teach his children that they were descended from monkeys cast a
doubt upon himself which he found intolerable. After that the wave
of protest swept through the colleges.
The students marched in processions carrying banners with the motto
"Are we baboons? Rah, Rah, Apes!" The Rotary Clubs of town after
town voted by a standing vote that they were unable to support (or
to understand) the doctrine of biological biogenesis, and they
wanted it taken away.
The Woman's Culture Club of Winona, Utah, moved that the name of
Charles Darwin be changed in the text books of the state to that of
W. J. Bryan. The Anti-Saloon League voted that the amount of
Darwinianism that should be licensed in the schools should not be
more than one-half of one per cent.
It is to meet this difficult situation that the present outline of
Evolution has been prepared. It is intended so to revise and
modify the rigid character of the theory as to make it acceptable
to everybody.
The obvious beginning of the matter is to present the theory of
evolution as it stood before the trouble began in Tennessee. Each
of us at that time carried in his head an outline, a little bit
hazy, but still usable, of the Doctrine of Evolution as we
remembered it from our college training.
Outline of Evolution as Dimly Recalled from College Education
We are all descended from monkeys. This descent, however, took
place a long time ago and there is no shame in it now. It happened
two or three thousand years ago and must have been after and not
before the Trojan war.
We have to remember also that there are several kinds of monkeys.
There is the ordinary monkey seen in the street with the hand organ
(communis monacus), the baboon, the giboon (not Edward,) the
bright, merry, little chimpanzee, and the hairy ourang-outang with
the long arms. Ours is probably the hairy ourang-outang.
But the monkey business is only part of it. At an earlier stage
men were not even that. They probably began as worms. From that
they worked up to being oysters; after that they were fish, then
snakes, then birds, then flying squirrels, and at last monkeys.
The same kind of change passed over all the animals. All the
animals are descended from one another. The horse is really a
bird, and is the same animal as the crow. The differences between
them are purely superficial. If a crow had two more feet and no
feathers it would be a horse except for its size.
The whole of these changes were brought about by what is called the
Survival of the Fittest. The crookedest snake outlived the others.
Each creature had to adapt itself or bust.
The giraffe lengthened its neck. The stork went in for long legs.
The hedgehog developed prickles. The skunk struck out an
independent line of its own. Hence the animals that we see about
us--as the skunk, the toad, the octopus, and the canary--are a
highly selected lot.
This wonderful theory was discovered by Charles Darwin. After a
five-year voyage in the Beagle as a naturalist in the Southern
Seas, Darwin returned to England and wrote a book called Sartor
Resartus which definitely established the descent of mankind from
the avoirdupois apes.
One must admit that in this form the theory does not seem
calculated to give any great offense to anybody. One must
therefore suppose that the whole of the present bitter controversy
arose out of what Darwin himself must have written. But this is
obviously not so. I have not actually before me the text of
Darwin's own writings, but I recall the general run of what he
wrote with sufficient accuracy to reproduce it here.
Darwin's Own Statement
Personal Recollection of the Work of the Great Naturalist
"On the Antilles the common crow, or decapod, has two feet while in
the Galapagos Islands it has a third. This third foot, however,
does not appear to be used for locomotion, but merely for
conversation. Dr. Anderson of H.M.S. Unspeakable during his visit
to the Galapagos Islands in 1834 saw two crows sitting on a tree.
One was, apparently, larger than the other. Dr. Anderson also saw
a lizard at Guayaquil in Ecuador which had lost one toe. In fact,
he had quite a good time.
"It would be too much to say that the crow and the lizard are the
same bird. But there seems little doubt that the apex cervicus of
the lizard is of the same structure as the rudimentary dorsal fin
of the crow. I put forward this statement however with the modesty
which it deserves and am only led to it with deep reluctance and
with a full sense of its fatal character.
"I may say that I myself while off the Oesophagus Islands in H.M.S.
Impossible in the year 1835 saw a flock of birds of the kind called
by the sailors "bum-birds," which alighted on the masts and held on
by their feet. In fact, I saw a lot of interesting things like
that.
"While I was in the Beagle, I recall that on one occasion we landed
on the Marquesas Islands where our captain and his party were
entertained by the chief on hams and yams. After the feast a group
of native women performed a hula-hula dance during which I wandered
out into the woods and secured a fine collection of toads.
"On the next island--while the captain and his officers were
watching a hitchi-kitchi dance--I picked up some admirable
specimens of lizards and was fortunate enough to bring back a
pocketful of potato bugs."
After reading this plain account as quoted, or at least as
remembered, direct from Darwin, one must admit that there is no
reason to try to rob him of his discoveries.
But to make the case still plainer, let us set alongside of this a
clear simple statement of the Theory of Evolution as it is now held
by the scientists in our colleges. I have before me the
enunciation of the doctrine as stated at the request of the press
by a distinguished biologist during the height of the present
controversy. What he says runs, as follows--or very nearly as
follows:
"All controversy apart, we must at least admit the existence of a
continuous morphological protoplasmic differentiation--"
That seems to me a fair, manly statement of a plain fact.
"Cytology is still in its infancy--"
This is too bad, but it will grow.
"But at least it involves the admission of a primitive conformity
which removes any a priori difficulty in the way of evolution."
So there we are. After that one would think that the Tennessee
schools would have no further difficulty about the thing.
The Time of Evolution
But even if we reach a definite conclusion as to the nature of the
process by which life gradually appeared and assumed higher and
higher forms, the question still remains--over how great a period
did the process last? What time element must be interposed? In
other words as Henri Bergson once stated it with a characteristic
flash of genius, "How long did it take?"
The earlier estimates of evolutionary scientists placed the age of
man at about 500,000 years. This was ridiculously low. You can't
evolve any kind of real man in that time. Huxley boldly raised the
figures to 1,000,000. Lord Kelvin, amid unusual applause, put it
up to 2,000,000 years. The cheers had hardly died away when Sir
Ray Lankester disturbed the whole universe by declaring that man
was 4,000,000 years old. Two years later a professor of the
Smithsonian Institute raised it to 5,000,000. This estimate was
seen and raised to 10,000,000 years. This again was raised from
year to year amid universal enthusiasm.
The latest advices are that a student in Schenectady Technical High
School places the age of man at 100,000,000 years. For a rough
working estimate, therefore, the business man will not be far wrong
in assuming (for practical purposes) that the age of man is
anything from 100,000,000 to 1,000,000,000. Night watchmen are
perhaps a little older.
Postscript: Up-to-Date Corrections of the Darwinian Theory
A still more cheerful light is thrown on the evolution controversy
by the fact that modern biologists do not entirely hold with the
theory of Charles Darwin. I find on inquiry that they are prepared
to amend his evolution doctrine in a variety of points.
It seems that Darwin laid too much stress on what he called natural
selection and the survival of the fittest. The modern biologist
attaches no importance to either of these. It seems also that
Darwin overestimated very much the part played by heredity. He was
moreover mistaken in his idea of the changes of the species. It is
probable, too, that his notion of a monkey is inadequate. It is
doubtful also whether Darwin ever actually sailed on the Beagle.
He may have been in the Phineas Q. Fletcher of Duluth. Nor is it
certain that his name was Darwin.
Volume Three--The Business Outline of Astronomy
The world or universe in which we do our business consists of an
infinite number, perhaps a hundred billion, perhaps not, of blazing
stars accompanied by comets, dark planets, asteroids, asterisks,
meteors, meteorites and dust clouds whirling in vast circles in all
directions and at all velocities. How many of these bodies are
habitable and fit for business we do not know.
The light emitted from these stars comes from distances so vast
that most of it is not here yet. But owing to the great distance
involved the light from the stars is of no commercial value. One
has only to stand and look up at the sky on a clear starlight night
to realize that the stars are of no use.
Practically all our efficient light, heat and power comes from the
sun. Small though the sun is, it gives out an intense heat. The
business man may form some idea of its intensity by imagining the
entire lighting system of any two great American cities grouped
into a single bulb; it would be but little superior to the sun.
The earth revolves around the sun and at the same time revolves on
its own axis, the period of its revolution and the rising and
setting of the sun being regulated at Washington, D.C. Some years
ago the United States government decided to make time uniform and
adopted the system of standard time; an agitation is now on foot--
in Tennessee--for the lengthening of the year.
The moon, situated quite close to the earth but of no value,
revolves around the earth and can be distinctly seen on a clear
night outside the city limits. During a temporary breakdown of the
lighting plant in New York city a few years ago the moon was quite
plainly seen moving past the tower of the Metropolitan Life
building. It cleared the Flatiron building by a narrow margin.
Those who saw it reported it as somewhat round but not well shaped,
and emitting an inferior light which showed that it was probably
out of order.
The planets, like the earth, move around the sun. Some of them are
so far away as to be of no consequence and, like the stars, may be
dismissed. But one or two are so close to the earth that they may
turn out to be fit for business. The planet Mars is of special
interest inasmuch as its surface shows traces of what are evidently
canals which come together at junction points where there must be
hotels. It has been frequently proposed to interest enough capital
to signal to Mars, and it is ingeniously suggested that the signals
be SENT IN SIX LANGUAGES.
Volume Four--Outline of Recent Advances in Science
Specially Designed for Members of Women's Culture Clubs, and
Representing Exactly the Quantity of Information Carried Away From
Lectures on Scientific Progress
Einstein's Theory of Relativity: Einstein himself is not what one
would call a handsome man. When seen by members of the Fortnightly
Women's Scientific Society in Boston he was pronounced by many of
them to be quite insignificant in appearance. Some thought,
however, that he had a certain air of distinction, something which
they found it hard to explain but which they FELT. It is certain
that Einstein knows nothing of dress. His clothes appear as if
taken out of the rag bag, and it is reported by two ladies who
heard him speak at the University of Pennsylvania on the
measurement of rays of light that he wore an absolutely atrocious
red tie. It is declared to be a matter of wonder that no one has
ever told him; and it is suggested that some one ought to take hold
of him.
Einstein is not married. It has been reported, by members of the
Trenton (New Jersey) Five O'clock Astronomical Investigation Club
that there is a romance in his life. He is thought to have been
thrown over by a girl who had a lot of money when he was a poor
student, and it was this that turned his mind to physics. It is
held that things work that way. Whether married or not he
certainly behaved himself like a perfect gentleman at all the clubs
where he spoke. He drinks nothing but black coffee.
Einstein's theories seem to have made a great stir.
Madame Curie's Discoveries in Radio-Activity: Madame Curie may be
a great scientist but it is doubted whether she is a likeable woman
or a woman who could make a home. Two members of the Omaha Woman's
Astronomical and Physical Afternoon Tea Society heard her when she
spoke in Washington on the Radiation of Gamma Particles from
Helium. They say that they had some difficulty in following her.
They say she was wearing just a plain coat and skirt but had quite
a good French blouse which certainly had style to it. But they
think that she lacks charm.
Rutherford's Researches in the Atomic Theory: Ernest Rutherford,
or rather Sir Ernest Rutherford as it is right to call him because
he was made a knight a few years ago for something he did with
molecules, is a strikingly handsome man in early middle age. Some
people might consider him as beginning to get old but that depends
on the point of view. If you consider a man of fifty an old man
then Sir Ernest is old. But the assertion is made by many members
of various societies that in their opinion a man is at his BEST at
fifty. Members who take that point of view would be interested in
Rutherford. He has eyes of just that pale steely blue which
suggest to members something powerful and strong, though members
are unable to name it. Certainly he made a perfectly wonderful
impression on The Ladies Chemico-Physical Research and Amusement
Society in Toronto, when he was there with that large British body.
Members of clubs meeting Sir Ernest should remember that he won the
Nobel Prize and that it is not awarded for character but is spelled
differently.
II
Brotherly Love Among the Nations
The Next War
From everything which I read in the press, I feel certain that it
is coming. There doesn't seem the slightest doubt about it. It
may not come for a month and it might be a year in coming, but
there is no doubt the Next War is already looming in sight. I have
gathered together all the documents that prove it--interviews and
discussions with the leading men concerned in it, who simply must
know what they are talking about. Let me lay some of them before
the reader and he can see for himself, on the very best authority,
the situation that confronts us:
Document No. 1
The Alignment in the Next War
New York, July 25: Colonel The Honourable Fizzle Bangspark of the
British General Army Staff, who arrived in New York on the
Megalomania, expressed his views to the representatives of the
press on the prospects of the Next War. The Colonel is confident
that in the Next War, which he thinks may begin at any time, it is
most likely the alignment will be that of Great Britain, France,
and the United States against Germany and Russia.
But he may think it equally likely that it may be fought as between
Great Britain, Russia, and Germany against France, the United
States, and Portugal. Colonel Bangspark states, however, that
though the war is certain the exact alignment of the nations will
be very difficult to foresee.
He thinks it possible that England and Switzerland, if they get a
good opportunity, may unite against France and Scotland. But it is
altogether likely that in a war of magnitude, such as Colonel
Bangspark hopes to see, the United States and China will insist on
coming in, either on one side or the other. "If they do,"
continued Colonel Bankspark, "it will be hard to keep them out."
The distinguished officer considers it difficult to say what part
Japan will play in the Next War, but he is sure that it will get
into it somewhere. When asked about the part that would be played
by the races of Africa in the coming conflict, Colonel Bangspark
expressed a certain amount of doubt. "It is hard to say," he
stated, "whether they can get in in time. They number of course a
great many millions, but the question really turns on whether they
have had a training sufficient to let them in. As yet their armies
would be hardly destructive enough, and it would be very poor
policy to let them in if they do not turn out to be deadly enough
when they get in.
"The black," said the colonel, "is a good fellow and I like him.
If he were put under first class European officers, he might prove
fairly murderous. But I am not as yet prepared to say that we can
make a profitable use of him in the Next War."
Asked if the Chinese would play a large part in the coming
struggle, the distinguished officer again hesitated. "The
Chinaman," he claims, "has not yet had enough contact with European
civilizations. The Chinaman is by nature a pacifist and it will be
hard to get him away from the idea of peace."
Asked finally if the South Sea Islanders would be in the struggle,
Colonel Bangspark spoke warmly and emphatically in their favor.
"They will be in it from the start," he said. "I know the
Polynesians well, having helped to organize native troops in the
Marquesas Islands where I was quartered at Popo Popo for two years,
and in the Friendly Islands and in the Society Islands and in the
Paradise Group, where I was the first man to introduce gunpowder.
"The Marquesas Islander," the colonel went on, "is a splendid
fellow. In many ways he is ahead of us Europeans. His work with
the blowpipe and the poison dart antedates the use of poison in
European warfare and compares favorably with the best work of our
scientific colleges."
When questioned as to which side the Marquesas Islanders would come
in on, the colonel stated that he did not regard that as a matter
of prime importance. He was convinced, however, that a place would
be found for them and he hoped to see them in the front trenches
(on one side or the other) on the first day.
Colonel Bangspark expressed himself as delighted with all that he
has seen on this side of the water. He says that he was immensely
pleased with the powder works on the Hudson, and though he had not
yet seen the powder works on the Potomac, he was convinced that
they were just as delightful.
The colonel, whose sojourn in our country is to last for some
weeks, will shortly leave New York to visit the powder works at
South Chicago. He is accompanied on his journey by his wife and
little daughter, both of whom he expects will be blown up in the
Next War.
Document No. 2
The Peril From The Air
New York, July 25: General de Rochambeau-Lafayette, Director-in-
Chief of the French Aerial forces, was interviewed yesterday at the
Ritzmore Hotel as to the prospects of world peace. The General,
whose full name is the Marquis de Rochambeau-Lafayette de Liancourt
de la Rochefoucauld, belongs to the old noblesse of France, and is
a cultivated French gentleman of the old school. He is himself a
veteran of seven wars and is decorated with the croix militaire,
the croix de guerre, the nom de plume, and the cri de Paris.
The Next War will, the count thinks, be opened, if not preceded, by
the bombing of New York from the air. The hotels, which the count
considers comfortable and luxurious above anything in Europe, will
probably be blown up on the first day. The Metropolitan Museum of
Art which General de Rochambeau visited yesterday and which he
regards as equal to anything in the south of France, would
undoubtedly afford an admirable target for a bomb.
The general expressed his unbounded astonishment at the size and
beauty of the Pennsylvania and the Grand Central stations. Both,
he said, would be blown up immediately. No air squadron could
afford to neglect them.
"And your great mercantile houses," the count continued
enthusiastically, "are admirable. Combining as they do, a wide
superficies with an outline sufficiently a pic to make it an
excellent point de mire, they could undoubtedly be lifted into the
air at one bombing."
Document No. 3
The Coming Conflict On The Sea
New York, July 25: Admirable Breezy, who represents the jolliest
type of the hearty British sailor and who makes a delightful
impression everywhere, is of the opinion that the Next War will be
fought not only on land but on the sea and in the sky and also
under the sea.
"It will be fought all over the shop," said the Admirable, "but I
do trust that the navy will have its fair share." The big
battleship, he says, is after all the great arm of defense. "We
are carrying guns now forty feet long and with an effective range
of twenty-five miles." "Give me a gun ten feet longer," said the
Admirable, "and I will stand off New York and knock down your bally
city for you."
He offered further, if given a gun sixty feet long, to reach
Philadelphia, and that if he were given the right gun platform he
could perhaps hit Pittsburgh.
"I don't despair even of Chicago," said the Admirable. "We are
moving forward in naval gunnery every year. It is merely a matter
of size, length, and range. I could almost promise you that in ten
years I could have a smack at St. Louis and Omaha. Canada,
unfortunately, will mostly be on our side; otherwise, one might
have had a bang at Winnipeg."
Admirable Breezy said that while he was warmly in favor of peace,
he felt that a sea war between England and the United States would
certainly make for good fellowship and mutual understanding between
the two navies. "We don't know one another," he complained, "and
under present circumstances I don't see how we can. But if our
fellows could have a smack at your fellows, it would make for a
good understanding of all round."
The Admiral is to speak in Carnegie Hall tonight on "What England
Owes to the United States." A large attendance (of financial men)
is expected.
Document No. 4
The New Chemical Terror
New York, July 26: Professor Gottlos Schwefeldampf, the
distinguished German chemist, who is at the head of the German
Kriegschemiefabrik at Stinken in Bavaria, arrived in New York
yesterday on the Hydrophobia and is at the Belmore Hotel. The
professor, who is a man somewhat below middle stature, is extremely
short-sighted, and is at present confined to his room from the
effects of a fall down the elevator. He speaks with the greatest
optimism on the prospects of chemical warfare.
He considers that it has a wonderful future before it. "In the
last war," he declared, sitting up in bed as much as a rheumatic
infliction of long standing enabled him to do, "we were only
beginning. We have developed now a gas which will easily
obliterate the population of a whole town. It is a gas which is
particularly destructive in the case of children, but which gives
also very promising results with adults."
The professor spoke to the members of the press of the efficiency
of this new discovery. Half a pint of the gas let loose in
the room, he said, would easily have annihilated the eight
representatives of the press who were present with him. He
regretted that unfortunately he had none of the gas in a condition
for instant use.
"But we shall not rely alone on gas," continued Professor
Schwefeldampf. "In the Next War we expect to make a generous use
of poison. Our poison factories are developing methods whereby we
can poison the crops in the ground a hundred miles away. If our
present efforts reach a happy conclusion, we shall be able to
poison the livestock of an entire country. I need not dilate," he
said, "on the favorable results of this--"
The Professor was interrupted by a violent fit of coughing, after
which he sank back so exhausted that the members of the press were
unable to prod any more copy out of him and left.
There! That's about the picture, not a bit exaggerated, of where
we are letting this poor old world drift to. Can we manage, my
dear people, to do something to stir up a little brotherly love all
round? We ought to do it even if we have to send hundreds of
people to jail to get it. As for me, I intend to start towards it
right away. The very next time I see on the street a Russian
Bolshevik with black whiskers like an eclipse of the sun, I shall
go right up to him and kiss him and say, "Come, Clarence, let us
forget the past and begin again."
International Amenities
Can We Wonder That It's Hard To Keep Friends?
I have been much impressed lately by the way in which the habit of
"scathing denunciation," back and forward across the Atlantic, is
growing in the press. Every time when international news gets a
little slack somebody lands off a steamer and says something about
British Education or about American women that sets the whole press
into a flame. The people who say the things are of no possible
importance. They are for the most part people of whom nobody ever
heard before and never will again. But that doesn't matter. The
newly arrived visitor stands up on the deck of his steamer, gets
the reporters all grouped around him in a ring and then begins to
"denounce." As a result next morning the newspapers of the entire
continent carry news items such as the following, and the public
seethes with indignation.
Denounces American Education
New York, April --:
"Mr. Farquhar McSquirt, who holds a high position in the
Kindergarten Department of the Scottish Orphans Asylums at
Dumfoolish, landed yesterday from the Aquitania on a tour of
inspection of the American and Canadian schools and at once uttered
a scathing denunciation of education on this continent. He
considers that the whole educational system of America is punk. He
admits that a great many pupils attend school on this continent but
denies that they learn a thing. He considers that the average boy
of twelve in the Orkney Islands knows more than a graduate of
Harvard and Yale. The American student, he says, has never learned
to THINK; whereas the Scottish boy begins to think very soon after
he learns to talk. Mr. McSquirt considers that the principal cause
of the defect of American education is the utter lack of qualified
teachers. He claims that the average American school teacher is a
complete nut. Few of them stay more than ten years in the
profession whereas in Scotland the average period is well over
fifty years."
As soon as this kind of thing has been spilt all over the map of
North America, the next thing to do is to mop it up. The
newspapers send out enquiries to ten heads of ten great
universities, and they all answer that while they have not the
pleasure of knowing Mr. McSquirt personally--which means that they
hope they never will know him--they emphatically deny his
strictures on our education. They claim that the average American
boy, while he may not have such long ears as a Scotch boy, is more
receptive. He may not know as much as a Scottish student but what
he knows he has digested, a thing the Scottish student has little
chance to do. After this the public is soothed and the affair dies
down.
Of course it must not be supposed that these "denunciations" are
all in one direction. I don't mean for a moment that they are
always directed against this continent. Not at all. That merely
depends on which direction the traveller is going in. If he is
headed the other way and is standing on British soil the
denunciation is turned around and it runs something after this
fashion.
Denounces Oxford
London, April --:
"Mr. Phineas Q. Cactus, T.Q., P.F., Principal of the Texas Normal
Institute for Feeble Minded Navajo Indians, has just attracted wide
attention here by a letter to the Morning Post in which he utters a
scathing denunciation of the University of Oxford. He claims that
at Oxford a student learns nothing. He admits that they go there
and they stay there, but he says that during the whole time in
Oxford no student ever thinks. In the schools of Texas no student
is admitted unless he has passed an examination in thinking and
during his entire course thinking is made compulsory at every step.
Principal Cactus considers that Oxford dulls a man's mind. He says
that after a course at Oxford the student is fit for nothing except
the Church or the bar or the House of Lords. He claims that the
average Oxford professor would make but a poor showing as a cowboy
in Texas."
Education is a splendid topic for this kind of business. But
perhaps an even better one is found in getting after our women and
girls and denouncing them across the Atlantic. This is always good
for ten days excitement. The sample press notice is as follows:
Denouncing American Girls
New York, April --:
"Lady Violet Longshanks, a direct descendant of Edward I, in the
male line, landed yesterday morning in New York from the Rule
Britannia. Lady Violet has at once excited widespread comment by
an interview which she gave on the dock to a representative of the
press. Her ladyship, who represents the haut ton of the oldest
noblesse and who is absolutely carte blanche, gave expression to a
scathing denunciation of the American girl. She declares that the
American girl of to-day is without manners. No American girl, the
Countess claims, knows how to enter a room, still less how to get
out of one. The American girl, according to Lady V. does not know
how to use her voice, still less how to use her feet. At the same
time the countess expressed herself fascinated with the size of the
United States which she considers is undoubtedly a country of the
future. Lady V. thinks it probable that many of the shortcomings
of the American girl may be due to her habit of chewing tobacco."
And so, of course, as soon as Lady V. has said all this it has to
be "mopped up" just like the other stuff. The press sends people
to interview five heads of five women's colleges and they all
declare that the American girl is as gentle as a lamb, and that if
Lady V. really gets to know the American girl she will find that
the American girl can use her feet, and will. As to the question
of chewing tobacco they need only say that perhaps Lady V. is
unaware that in all the first class women's colleges chewing
tobacco is expressly forbidden not only on the campus, but in the
bedrooms.
This reassures the public and gradually the trouble subsides and
everybody cools off and the American girl gets right back to where
she was. And then some American lady takes a trip over to England
and starts the whole trouble again in a reversed direction, like
this:
Denounces English Girls
London, April --:
"Mrs. Potter Pancake of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, President of the
American Women's International Friendship League, has just jarred
English society off its hinges by a sweeping condemnation, handed
out from the window of her hotel, directed against English girls.
Mrs. Pancake claims that the English girl is absolutely without
grace and that her movements are inferior to those of a horse.
Mrs. Pancake states further that the English girl moves like an
alligator and is unable to sit down. She considers that these
defects are mainly caused by drinking gin in inordinate
quantities."
Whereupon trouble breaks out all over the British press from
Cornwall to the Orkney Islands. The Archbishop of Canterbury is
consulted and issues a statement to the effect that in his opinion
the English girl is MORE graceful than a cow and that he has yet to
see an English girl of the cultivated class take what HE considers
too much gin. This eases things up a bit, and the good effect is
presently reinforced by a letter to the Times from the professor of
Arthopedic Surgery at the Royal College of Physicians who says that
he has made anthropometric measurements of over a thousand English
girls and that their shapes suit HIM down to the ground. After
that the trouble blows over and international friendship is just
getting settled again and there is every prospect of the payment of
the British debt and the scrapping of both navies and the rise of
the pound sterling away over par, when someone starts it all off
again with this:
Thinks Americans Crooked
"Mr. Joseph Squidge, M.P. Labor member for the mining district of
Hiddaway-under-the-Sea, has just returned from a three weeks tour
of America. Mr. Squidge, who visited the entire United States from
New York to Yonkers, has just given an interview to the local paper
at Hiddaway in which he says that public honesty is extinct in
America. He considers that the entire population of the United
States, not excepting the criminal classes, is crooked. He says
that in America a man's word is never taken and that even in hotels
a guest is required to sign his name."
This of course is too much--more than any decent people can stand,
and as a consequence some one is at once sent over to England,
either by accident or by design with the result that in a week or
two the whole American press carries a despatch as follows:
Thinks British Dishonest
New York, April --:
"Edward Angle Eye, a journalist representing five thousand American
Farmers Newspapers, has just cabled from London to Coffin Creek,
Idaho, to say that the British are all liars. He says that with
the possible exception of the Prince of Wales and Queen Mary, it is
impossible to trust anybody in the British Isles. Public morality
he claims has reached its lowest ebb and is washing away. He
attributes the trouble to the large influx of Chinese in London."
And after that, can you wonder if we find it a little hard to keep
peace and good will across the Atlantic.
French Politics for Beginners
As Explained in a Series of Cables From our Own Special
Correspondent in Paris
Paris, 10.30 a.m.
Nothing this morning intimated the imminence of a cabinet crisis.
The sky was of spotless serenity, and the whole aspect of the city
one of brightness and gayety. The hotels were full of tourists,
the shops were crowded, the fountains were running, Punch and Judy
was playing in the Champs Elysées, and the French franc which had
shown signs of restlessness the day before had passed a quiet
night.
The Chamber of Deputies, however, had hardly met at 10 o'clock in
the Palais Bourbon when Mr. Painlevé rose in his seat and asked the
premier if he knew what time it was. Mr. Briand replied that his
watch had stopped. Mr. Painlevé rushing on to the floor in front
of the tribune, demanded from the chamber whether a man whose watch
had stopped was fit to be the premier of France. Instantly the
chamber was in an uproar. Shouts of "A Bas, Briand!"--were mingled
with cries of "Attaboy, Aristide!"
Mr. Briand, who preserved throughout the most complete calm, then
asked for a vote of the chamber. The vote at once showed that not
only was the whole of the Left side against Mr. Briand but also a
bit of the Center and the East and South and some of the North-
West. Mr. Briand immediately resigned and the great government
which had presided over the destiny of France and weathered every
storm for six days, went out of office.
Paris, 12.30 p.m.
It has now been learned that on the news of Mr. Briand's
resignation the President of the Republic summoned Mr. Painlevé to
the Palace of the Elysées and asked him if he could form a cabinet.
On Mr. Painlevé asking for time the President said that he could
have twenty minutes. Mr. Painlevé drove at once to the Chamber of
Deputies and, crossing the floor of the house where Mr. Briand sat,
kissed him on both cheeks and asked him if he would join his
government. Mr. Briand, having thrown his arms around Mr.
Painlevé, announced his willingness to join him. Within a few
moments the chamber was informed of the formation of the Painlevé-
Briand ministry, the news being greeted with acclamation.
The Painlevé-Briand Ministry
The president of the session having announced a ten minutes
adjournment to allow the new ministry to make a budget, it became
clear that the Painlevé-Briand ministry would find itself in a
position of great strength. It will have the support of the whole
radical bloc, together with a chunk of Socialists and about half a
bloc of conservatives. No French government, for the last six
months, has been in such a position of power. Briand, it is said
with great satisfaction, will be virtually a dictator over the
destinies of France. As soon as the news was disseminated on the
Bourse the franc humped itself up two and a half points.
Paris, 11.45 a.m.
Mr. Briand and Mr. Painlevé, entering the chamber with their arms
round one another's waists, read out their budget to a breathless
house. The aim of the new government will be to put the finances
of France on a basis of absolute stability. To do this they will
at once borrow 4,000,000,000 francs. The loan, however, will be
offset and made good by a credit with the Bank of France, which
will then float a loan with the public, who will then be
authorized, by a decree, to borrow from the bank. The entire
credit thus created will be added up and declared extinguished.
The announcement of the budget policy was received with a salvo of
enthusiasm, the entire left embracing the whole of the right.
Fall of the Government
Paris, 12.30 p.m.
The Briand-Painlevé government has fallen. Entrenched in power as
it seemed behind a solid parliamentary support, it fell suddenly
and unexpectedly on an interpellation during the budget debate.
Mr. Raymond Poincaré, who is generally regarded as the master mind
of French politics, rose during the discussion of budget and asked
whether the government intended to retain the tax on beer. On Mr.
Briand's saying that it was proposed to keep this tax, Mr. Poincaré
declared that the true national policy would be to let the Germans
drink enough beer to pay taxes for both nations. If they couldn't
do it they should be made to. The whole chamber seethed with
enthusiasm, during which Mr. Briand and Mr. Painlevé announced that
their government was at an end. The president of the chamber,
calling for order amid the tumult, asked if there was any gentleman
present who could form a new government. Mr. Poincaré offered to
do so if the president would let him talk with Mr. Painlevé and Mr.
Briand outside for a few minutes. The permission being given the
three statesmen shortly afterward reentered the chamber and
announced that they had succeeded in combining themselves into a
ministry to be called the Poincaré-Painlevé-Briand Ministry.
Poincaré-Painlevé-Briand Ministry
Mr. Poincaré said, however, that they would only do this if they
could be assured of a block behind them. If there was no block
they wouldn't be a ministry. The enthusiasm of the Left together
with part of the Right and a little bit of the Top, made it clear
that the new ministry will receive an ample support. An
adjournment was made with universal congratulations.
Fall of the French Ministry
Paris, 3.30 p.m.
The new French government, which was formed by Mr. Poincaré with
the support of Mr. Painlevé and Mr. Briand fell right after lunch.
Details are yet lacking. Apparently it came into the chamber after
lunch and fell. There is a general consternation. The Bourse is
wildly excited and all the exchanges reacted sharply. It is said
that the Governor of the Bank of France will be arrested and
perhaps the Archbishop of Paris. It is whispered that the fall of
the ministry was occasioned by Mr. Joseph Caillaux, who seated
himself in the chamber and looked at the ministry with that
inscrutable look which he has, till it fell.
The Caillaux-Poincaré-Painlevé-Briand Ministry
Paris, 4.15 p.m.
A certain measure of calm has been restored in Paris by the
announcement that an entirely new ministry has been formed by the
union of Mr. Caillaux--Mr. Poincaré--Mr. Painlevé and Mr. Briand.
In a statement to the press Mr. Briand said that the old government
had outlived its usefulness and that he welcomed the addition of
Mr. Caillaux. A new budget would be made at once and would
constitute, he said, the best budget of the last three weeks. This
budget, which will absolutely ensure the stability of French
finance will be based on a vote of National Credit supported by a
Universal Loan and guaranteed by a Public Debt. Mr. Caillaux,
whose financial genius never shone more brightly, is working out a
tax, to replace the proposed capital levy and the income tax, and
to be called the Tax on Somebody Else.
It is said in well-informed circles that if the government can be
widened to include a royalist element and to take in a few
communists and a bloc of socialists, its success will be assured.
If it can then pursue a policy which will be sufficiently clerical
and conservative while at the same time strongly socialist, with a
touch of opportunism, it may last till Saturday.
Meantime the theatres are all open, work is plentiful, everybody is
happy, Paris is bright with spring flowers, the hotels are full of
Americans dripping with money, the new fashions are said to be
simply charming, the skirts don't reach anywhere, the watering
places are wetter than ever--so what does a little thing like a
government matter?
The Mother of Parliaments
But What has Lately Gone Wrong With Mother?
"The House of Commons," says the well known Guide Book to London of
Today, "not inaptly called the Mother of Parliaments, is
undoubtedly the most august, as it is the most venerable, of the
great representative assemblies of the world. It is with something
like awe that we penetrate into the stillness of Westminster
Palace, and find ourselves presently looking down from our
privileged place in the gallery upon the earnest group of men whose
measured tones and dignified formalities are deciding the fate of
an empire."
That is what the Guide Book has been saying about the House of
Commons for some two hundred years. But in reading over the press
reports of the debates of the House within the last year or so as
they come across the Atlantic, one is inclined to wonder whether
the cold dignity of the dear old place is not getting a little
thawed out in the warm times in which we live.
The proceedings in the later days sound a little too suggestive of
the Cowboys Convention of Montana, or the meeting of the Literary
Philosophical Society of Dawson City, Yukon. Take in illustration
the following report of the proceedings of one day some months ago,
taken verbatim from the London Times and the London Morning Post or
the Labor Herald--I forget which. At any rate, those who read the
debates of the house will recognize it at once as genuine.
"The House of Commons resumed its session yesterday at three
o'clock. The Prime Minister in rising from the Treasury Benches to
present his bill for the introduction of Buckwheat into the
Tanganyika district of Uganda, stated that he would like first to
refer to the fact that some member of the House had just thrown a
banana at the Speaker. He would ask members to realize that
throwing bananas at the Speaker impeded the business of the House.
He would go so far as to say that it was bad manners.
"At the word 'manners' the House broke into an uproar. Cries arose
from the labor benches, 'Manners! Yah! Manners!'
"Lady Luster at once leapt to her feet and said that there were
members in the House whose manners were not fit for a stable.
"Joseph Dockside, M.P. for the Buckingham Palace district, asked if
she meant him. Lady Luster called out that she did. The Speaker
rose to a ruling against personal mention quoting a precedent under
Henry VIII. But another banana hit him and he sat down.
"Mr. Dockside began to cry. He asked the House if it was fair to
let an idle woman like Lady Luster tell him that he had no manners.
He was only a poor man and had no schooling, and how could he even
get a chance to pick up manners, even fit for a stable. Here he
broke into sobs again while the labor benches resounded with the
cries of 'Shame!' and the blowing of horns.
"Lady Luster then said that she had gone too far. She would take
back the word stable. She meant 'Garage.'
"The Speaker, quoting a precedent from Edward the Confessor, said
that the debate might go on--a pineapple hitting him in the
waistcoat just before, and as, he sat down.
"The Prime Minister then said that as quiet had been restored (loud
cries of 'Rah! Rah! Quiet!,') he would resume his speech on the
proposal of the government to subsidize the growing buckwheat--and,
he would add, buckoats--in the Tanganyika district.
"At this point he was interrupted by Colonel MacAlpin MacFoozle,
independent member for the East Riding of the West Hebrides. The
Colonel wanted to know how the Prime Minister could speak of
Tanganyika if he was fully aware of the condition of Scotland. Did
he know of the present distress among the crofters? Was he aware
of what was happening to the Scottish gillies, and the laddies and
collies?
"Did he know that three more men had left the Hebrides? The
Colonel, who spoke with violent passion, to the great delight of
the House, said that he didn't give a curse for buckwheat or for
Tanganyika and that personally he could lick the whole cabinet.
"At this, loud shouts of 'Attaboy! You're the hot stuff,' were
mingled with cries of 'Put him out!' Lady Luster called out that
if the Scots would quit drinking Scotch whiskey they would all save
enough money to leave Scotland.
"For the moment, the transaction of public business was seriously
threatened when Lord Pintop Daffodil rose and asked the Speaker's
leave to tell a funny story. Lord Pintop, who is rapidly gaining
the reputation of being the third funniest member of the House, was
greeted with encouraging laughter and applause.
"The Speaker having ruled that a funny story had been told under
Queen Anne, Lord Pintop then related a story of how a Pullman car
passenger was put off at Buffalo by the porter. The House, which
is easily moved from anger to merriment and which enjoys nothing
(except its lunch) so much as a good joke, was convulsed with
laughter.
"The Speaker, in thanking the honorable member for the story, said
that he believed that it was the same story as was told under Queen
Anne.
"The Prime Minister then said he would resume his speech on
buckwheat. He was about to do so when Mr. Ilyitch Halfoff, member
for the Russian district of Westminster, said that he would like
first to rise and present a resolution for the immediate
introduction of communism into England. The House was in a turmoil
in a minute.
"Cries of 'Russia for ever!' were mixed with the singing of the
'Marseillaise' and the countersinging of 'Scots Whoo Hoo!' It was
said afterwards that the singing was the best ever heard in the
House this month.
"At this point in the debate the yeoman usher of the Black Stick
rushed into the House and called--'Hurry out, boys, there is a
circus procession coming down Whitehall!' The whole House rushed
out in a body, only the speaker remaining behind for one minute to
adjourn the session."
New Light from New Minds
A Study in International Interviews
People who read the newspapers regularly must have noticed that the
reported Interviews are getting to be much brighter and more
interesting than they used to be. Till recently, when the press
interviewed travellers, distinguished visitors and political
emissaries, they talked to each of them about his own particular
line of life and the things about which he was supposed to know
something. The result was fearful dullness. A director of the
Bank of England was interviewed about currency, an actor was
interviewed about the stage and a bishop about religion. As a
consequence every one of them got prosy and unintelligible.
Nowadays the thing is done in exactly the other way. Each
distinguished visitor is asked questions about something that is
outside of his own line of life. A vaudeville comedian gives his
impressions of French politics and an English bishop gives his
views of women's skirts. The result is a freshness and a charm
which lends a new attraction to our newspapers on both sides of the
Atlantic. Here are a few examples taken from the current press and
drawn, as appears at once, indifferently from England and America.
Ball Player Visits St. Paul's
London, Friday: Ed Lanigan, star outfielder and manager of the
Tuscaloosa Base Ball Nine, passed through London this morning and
expressed himself as delighted with it. After he had had a run
round town, Ed gave his views, on some of the things he had seen,
to a crowd of assembled admirers at the Hotel Cecil. "What did you
think of St. Paul's, Ed?" asked one of the boys. "It's certainly
big stuff," said Ed, "and it gets me. Those old geysers certainly
knew how to build. And I want to tell you boys that there's
something about that building that you don't get everyday. I doubt
if there are a dozen men in New York to-day who could duplicate
it."
"How does the political situation in England strike you," he was
next queried. "Fine!" answered the big man. "They've sure got a
lot of taxes here. But then mind you there's a lot of wealth too.
Of course things are pretty bad, but you've got to remember they
were bad before, and anyway they're not so bad."
Movie Star Sees Riviera
Menton, Monday: Gus Phinn, the well-known movie star who is said
to command a salary of anywhere from half a million dollars,
was a recent visitor at Menton. Gus is enthusiastic over the
Mediterranean sea. "I want to tell you right now," he said to a
representative of the press, "that there is absolutely nothing
wrong with the Mediterranean." "What did you specially notice
about it, Gus?" asked the pressman. "Why, what gets me hardest is
the colour of the water. Say, I don't think you can beat that blue
anywhere. You might try but you can't do it." "Do you think,"
asked another of the group, "that the tone of English Social Life
is deteriorating?" "No, I don't," Gus replied. "I think the tone
is good. I think it A.1."
"What about the relations of England and France, Gus?" was another
question. "They're all right," the star answered. "We met a lot
of French boys on the boat and certainly nicer boys you wouldn't
want to meet. Well, they're gentlemen that's what they are. The
French are gentlemen."
"What about Germans, Gus?" one of the reporters ventured.
"All right!" answered the movie man heartily. "We had a German at
our table in the hotel and they're all right. Mind you I think we
were perfectly right in crushing them because they needed to be
crushed. But they're all right."
Copper King Looks at Oxford
Oxford, Tuesday: E. J. Slagg, the multimillionaire owner of mines
and president of Slagg Consolidated Copper, visited Oxford
yesterday and was shown round the colleges. The big copper man
whose quiet taciturnity and power of silence has made him the
terror of the stock exchange, looked about him at everything with
the same keen shrewdness with which he detects a vein of copper
under a hundred feet of trap rock. Only now and then he darted a
shrewd question or let fall a short comment.
"This place," he said, "is old." On the threshold of the Bodleian
Library he paused a moment as if rapidly measuring the contents
with his eye. "Mostly books?" he asked. The copper king also
paused a moment before the monument erected to the memory of
Latimer and Ridley. "What's the idea?" he asked.
But--as I said up above this new and brilliant flood of light is
not only turned on Europe. By a similar process it is let loose on
the American continent too.
British Lord Sees Jersey Tugs
New York, Wednesday: Lord Tinklepin who arrived from England on
the Aquitania yesterday was taken for a trip up and down the harbor
in a fast tug. His lordship expressed himself as amazed at the
commerce of New York. "I had no idea of it," he said. Passing by
one of the car ferries of the Erie Railway, Lord Tinklepin
expressed the keenest interest.
"What the devil is that?" he asked. On being told what it was, the
distinguished visitor who is well known for his interest in
physical science, at once asked "Why doesn't it upset?"
Lady Visitor Discusses American Banking
New York, Thursday: Lady Mary Messabout, President of the Women's
Federation for Universal Mutual Understanding, was shown round
financial New York yesterday as the guest of the Bankers
Association. Lady Mary expressed the greatest wonder at the Sub-
Treasury of the United States. "Is it possible" she said, "that
it's full of money?" Lady Mary was questioned by representatives
of the press as to her opinion of the American banking system. "It
is really excellent," she answered, "so little delay and such
civility everywhere." "Do you think,"--it was asked by a member of
the press--"that the deflation of American currency would check the
expansion of business." "Oh, I hope not," Lady Mary answered
warmly, "surely it would never do that."
French Baron Visits West
Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Friday: The Baron de Vieux Chateau, who
is visiting Saskatchewan with a view to seeing whether the richer
parts of Canada would be suited for the poorer class of Frenchmen,
was taken yesterday on a tour of inspection of the grain elevators
of Saskatoon. "But they are marvellous!" the Baron said to a
member of the press on his return to his hotel. "They seem to me
absolutely--how shall I say it--enormous." In further discussion
the Baron said the whole system of distributing the wheat seemed to
him excellent. When asked what his impression of the Farmer's
Cooperative movement was, the distinguished visitor again spoke
with enthusiasm. "But your farmers," he said, "they are wonderful!
What courage! What tenacity! To have come here and stayed here!
It is wonderful."
An Advance Cable Service
International News a Month Ahead
It has recently become the habit to send out and circulate all
sorts of special information in the form of "services." The
schools of commerce send out "financial services" with a forecast
of business conditions six months before they happen and some times
even six months before they don't happen. The departments of
agriculture send out crop reports even before the grain is planted.
The meteorologists keep at least a fortnight ahead of the weather.
Political forecasts are now ready for all the elections up to 1928.
The hard winter that is going to begin about Xmas time has been
definitely prophesied, in fact promised by the squirrels, the
groundhogs and the makers of fur garments and by the West Indian
Steamship agents.
It has occurred to me that a useful extension might be made to
these "services" by adding an Advance European Cable Service. By
this means all readers of newspapers, instead of having to read the
cables day by day, could get them in a lump a month at a time.
Anybody who has studied the newspapers of the last three or four
years recognises at once that the cables run in a regular round,
quite easy to prophesy. In the modest little attempt appended
below, I have endeavoured to put in merely the ordinary routine of
European public life for one month without prophesying anything of
an exceptional or extreme character.
German Revolution Coming
Berlin, Monday 1: A monarchical wave is reported as having swept
over Germany. The wildest excitement prevails. A hundred persons
were trampled to death in Berlin the other day. The return of His
Imperial Majesty the Kaiser is expected at any moment.
And Going
Berlin, Tuesday 2: A republican wave has swept over Germany in the
place of the monarchical wave of yesterday. Another hundred people
were trampled to death. William Hohenzollern is reported as still
at Doorn in Holland.
And Has Gone
Berlin, Wednesday 3: Germany is quiet. Christmas shopping is
beginning already. Everywhere there is cheerfulness and optimism.
Nobody was trampled to death all day.
Frenzied Finance in France
Paris, Thursday 4: Following on the sensational statement of
Monsieur Caillaux that France would pay her debts to the last
penny, the wildest excitement prevailed on the Bourse. The franc
which had been fairly steady all yesterday, rose to its feet, and
staggered right across the street where it collapsed in a heap.
Gloom prevails in financial circles.
Paris, Friday 5: Monsieur Caillaux has issued a supplementary
statement to the effect that France will pay all her debts but it
may take her a million years to do it. This assurance has restored
universal confidence and Monsieur Caillaux is hailed everywhere as
having redeemed the honor and credit of France. A tremendous
ovation was given him today when eating a sandwich at the lunch
counter. It is now said that Caillaux, who is recognised
everywhere as the financial saviour of France, is working out a
plan for wiping out the whole debt of France by borrowing it from
England.
Home Life in England
London, Saturday 6: England is face to face with a coal strike of
such magnitude that in twenty-four hours every fire in England will
go out. If the transport workers and the public house keepers join
the strike the whole industrial life of the nation will come to a
full stop. Meantime the Archbishop of Canterbury says that if he
can't get a satchelful of nut coal tonight he must close the
cathedral.
London, Monday 8: The coal strike was called off at five minutes
before midnight--one of the closest shaves of a total collapse of
England that has been reported in the last six months. Meantime
with cloudless skies and bright sunshine the whole attention of the
nation today is riveted on the champion football game between the
Huddersfield and Hopton-under-Lime. The Archbishop of Canterbury
will kick off the ball.
Italian Upheaval Heaving Up
Rome Tuesday 9: The Italian Fascisti have broken loose again.
Yesterday a man climbed up to the top of the Duomo at Milan and
waved a black shirt, shouting EVIVA ITALIA! The whole nation is in
a ferment. Anything may happen.
Rome, Wednesday 10: It is all right. It transpires that the shirt
was not black, it was merely very dirty.
Austria in Chaos
Vienna, Thursday 11: Mr. Edward Edelstein, vice-president of the
Canned Soup Company of Paterson, New Jersey who is making a ten day
tour in central Europe to study business conditions, describes the
situation of Austria as one of utter chaos. Trade is absolutely
stagnant. Business is almost extinct while the currency is in
entire confusion. In Vienna unemployment is everywhere, even the
rich are eating in soup kitchens; the theatres are closed and
social life is paralyzed.
Complete Revival of Austria
Vienna, Friday 12: Mr. John Smithers of Smitherstown, who is
taking a five days vacation in Europe reports that the economic
situation of Austria has been reestablished on a sound basis. The
restoration of the currency this morning by the establishment of a
new and easier mark, is working wonders. The factories are running
on full time, the shops are crowded with visitors, the hotels are
bursting with guests and the theatres are offering Shakespeare,
Grand Opera, and Uncle Tom's Cabin.
Vienna, Saturday 5: Austria has collapsed again.
Dear Old Russia
Petrograd (otherwise Leningrad or Trotskiville), Monday 15:
Reports from the Caucasus say that Red forces made a drive at the
Caucasians yesterday. The latter just got out of the road in time.
Tuesday 16: Word has been received that the Reds made a fierce
drive at Semipalatinsk. They only got half of it.
Wednesday 17: Wireless despatches say that the Reds are preparing
for a drive against the Persians. Most of the Persians have
already climbed up Mount Ararat.
Thursday 18: It is reported that the Council of Workmen's Soviets
of Moscow have passed a resolution declaring that universal peace
has come.
International Goodwill
Tokyo, Friday 19: Viscount Itch is reported in the Japanese Daily
Hootch as saying that the time has come when Japan can not tolerate
the existence of the United States on the other side of the
Pacific. It will have to be moved. Wild excitement prevailed
after the delivery of the speech. Enormous crowds paraded the
streets of Tokyo, shouting "Down with America!" An American
missionary was chased into a Chinese restaurant.
Tokyo, Saturday 20: Viscount Itch has issued a statement to the
effect that Japan and the United States are sisters. Wild
enthusiasm prevails. Great crowds are parading the streets,
shouting "Attaboi Coolidji!" The missionary has come down again.
Yokohama, Monday 22: The business section of Yokohama was
destroyed yesterday by an earthquake.
Yokohama, Tuesday 23: The business section of Yokohama has been
propped up again and nailed into position.
From the Far Away South Seas
London, Wednesday 24: Cable advices received via Fiji and
Melbourne report the Marquesas Islanders in a plebiscite have voted
for prohibition, direct legislation, proportional representation
and the abolition of cannibalism. Some more votes will be taken
next week.
Back from Europe
The Reaction of Travel on the Human Mind
There comes a time every year when all the hundreds of thousands of
people who have been over to Europe on a summer tour get back
again. It is very generally supposed that a tour of this kind
ought to have a broadening effect on the mind, and this idea is
vigorously propagated by the hotel companies at Schlitz, Bitz,
Biarritz, and picturesque places of that sort.
It is not for me to combat this idea. But I do know that in
certain cases at least a trip to Europe sets up a distinct
disturbance of the intellect. Some of these afflictions are so
well defined that they could almost be definitely classified as
diseases. I will quote only a few among the many examples that
might be given.
I
Aristocropsis, or Weakening of the Brain from Contact with the
British Aristocracy
There seems to be no doubt that a sudden contact with the titled
classes disturbs the nerve cells or ganglions of the traveler from
America, and brings on a temporary enfeeblement of mind. It is
generally harmless, especially as it is usually accompanied by an
extreme optimism and an exaggerated sense of importance.
Specimen Case. Winter conversation of Mr. John W. Axman, retired
hardware millionaire of Fargo, Dakota, in regard to his visit to
England.
"I don't know whether I told you that I saw a good deal of the Duke
of Dumpshire while I was in England. In fact, I went to see him at
his seat--all these dukes have seats, you know. You can say what
you like about the British aristocrats, but when you meet one like
the Duke of Dumpshire, they are all right. Why, he was just as
simple as you or me, or simpler. When he met me, he said, 'How are
you?' Just like that.
"And then he said, 'You must be hungry. Come along and let's see
if we can find some cold beef.' Just as easy as that. And then he
said to a butler or someone, 'Go and see if you can find some cold
beef.' And presently the butler came back and said, 'There's some
cold beef on the table, Sir,' and the Duke said, 'All right, let's
go and eat it.' And he went and sat right down in front of the
beef and ate it. Just as you or I would.
"All the time we were eating it, the Duke was talking and laughing.
He's got a great sense of humor, the Duke has. After he'd finished
the beef, he said, 'Well, that was a darn good piece of beef!' and
of course we both roared. The Duke's keen on politics, too--right
up to date about everything. 'Let's see,' he said, 'who's your
President now?' In fact, he's just as keen as mustard, and looks
far ahead too. 'France,' he said to me, 'is in for a hell of a
time.'"
II
Nuttolingualism, or Loss of One's Own Language after Three Weeks
across the Sea
Specimen No. 1. Verbatim statement of Mr. Phin Gulch, college
student from Umskegee College, Oklahoma, made immediately on his
return from a three weeks athletic tour in England with Oklahoma
Olympic Aggregation. "England certainly is a ripping place. The
chaps we met were simply topping. Of course here and there we met
a bounder, but on the whole one was treated absolutely top hole."
Specimen No. 2. Information in regard to French restaurants
supplied by Miss Phoebe McGinn, winner of the Beauty Contest Ticket
to Europe and Back from Boom City, Montana. "The Paris restaurants
are just charming and ever so cheap if you know where to go. There
was one we used to go to in a little rue close to the gare where we
got our dejeuner with croissants and cafe au lait for soixante-
quinze centimes.
"Of course we used to give the garcon another quinze centimes as a
pourboire. And after dejeuner we'd sit there half the matinee and
read the journaux and watch the people go past in the rue. Always,
when we left, the garcon would say, 'Au revoir.' Regular French,
you know."
III
Megalogastria, or Desire to Talk about Food
Specimen Case. Mr. Hefty Undercut, of Saskatoon, Saskatchewan,
retired hotel man, talks on European culture.
"I don't mind admitting that the English seem to me away ahead of
us. They're further on. They know how to do things better. Now
you take beefsteak. They cut it half as thick again as we do, and
put it right on a grid over hot coals. They keep the juice in it.
Or take a mutton chop. The way they cook them over there, you can
eat two pounds to one that you eat here. You see they're an older
people than we are.
"Or take sausages--when I travel I like to observe everything; it
makes you broader;--and I've noticed their sausages are softer than
ours, more flavoring to them. Or take one of those big deep meat
pies--why, they eat those big pies at midnight. You can do it
there. The climate's right for it.
"And, as I say, when I travel I go around noticing everything and
sizing everything up--the meat, the lobsters, the kind of soup they
have, everything. You see, over there there's very little sunlight
and the air is heavy and you eat six times a day. It's a great
place."
IV
Introspexosis, or Seeing in Other People What is Really in Yourself
It appears that many people when they travel really see nothing at
all except the reflection of their own ideas. They think that what
they are interested in is uppermost everywhere. They might just as
well stay at home and use a looking glass. Take in witness:
The evidence of Mr. Soggie Spinnage, Secretary of the Vegetarian
Society of North, Central, and South America, as given after his
return from a propaganda tour in England:
"Oh, there's no doubt the vegetarian movement is spreading in
England. We saw it everywhere. At Plymouth a man came right up to
me and he said, 'Oh, my dear Brother, I wish we had a thousand men
here like you. Go back,' he said, 'go back and bring over a
thousand others.' And wherever I spoke I met with such enthusiasm.
"I spoke, I remember, in Tooting-on-the-Hump--it's within half an
hour of London itself. And when I looked into their dear faces and
told them about the celery in Kalamazoo, Michigan, and about the
big cabbages in the South Chicago mud flats, they just came
flocking about me! 'Go back,' they said, 'go back and send those
over.'
"I heard a man in a restaurant one day say to the waiter, 'Just
fetch me a boiled cabbage. I want nothing else.' I went right up
to him, and I took his hand and I said, 'Oh, my dear friend, I have
come all the way from America just to hear that.' And he said, 'Go
back, he said, 'go back and tell them that you've heard it.'
"Why, when you go to England you just see vegetables, vegetables,
everywhere. I hardly seemed to see anything else. They say even
the King eats vegetables now. And they say the Bishop of London
only eats beans. I heard someone say that the Bishop seemed full
of beans all the time.
"Really I felt that the cause was just gaining and growing all the
time. When I came to leave, a little group of friends come down to
the steamer to say good-bye. 'Go back,' they said, 'go back and
send someone else.'
"That seemed to be the feeling everywhere."
III
Studies in the Newer Culture
A Little Study in Culture From Below Up
About fifteen years ago somebody invented the word Attaboy. At
first it was used only by the urchins on the baseball bleachers.
Presently it was used by the college students. After that it was
taken up by business men, lawyers, judges and congressmen and it
spread all over the world.
It was said that when King George of England welcomed home General
Allenby after his conquest of Palestine, he put his hands on
Allenby's shoulders and said with deep feeling, "Attaboy!"
The General, profoundly touched, was heard to murmur in return,
"Some King, what!"
This story may or may not be true. It is possible that King George
used merely some such dignified English phrase as "Not half bad at
all!" But the story at any rate illustrates the tremendous change
that has been creeping over our language.
I am not here referring to the use of slang. That of course is as
old as language itself. The man who uses a slang word and, let us
say, calls a man's hat his "lid" or calls a woman a "skirt," is
unconscious of using a metaphor and of trying to be funny or
peculiar. But the man who uses attaboy language in speech or
writing is really trying to say something; he really thinks he is
using English. It is not merely the words that he uses but the way
in which he uses them.
Let me give you an instance--that is much quicker business than
trying to explain the whole thing in a methodical fashion.
Attaboy Letter of Invitation
Here, for example--to illustrate the old style of writing and
speaking--is a letter which I received almost thirty years ago
inviting me to attend a gathering of my college class. In point of
dignity and good form the letter speaks for itself.
TORONTO, Feb. 1st, 1896.
DEAR SIR:
I beg to inform you that a reunion of the graduating class of 1891
will be held on the 5th of February in the form of a dinner at the
Queen's Hotel. The guest of honor on the occasion will be
Professor Baxter, who has kindly consented to deliver an address to
the class. It is confidently expected that all the members of the
class will take this opportunity to renew old friendships. The
price of the dinner, including wines, will be seventy-five cents.
May I ask you to send a reply at your earliest convenience.
With sincere personal regards,
I have the honor to be
And to remain being,
Yours very faithfully,
JOHN SMITH.
Now it happened that just the other day I received a letter from
the same old classmate inviting me to attend a similar gathering of
the class--thirty years later. But here is how he has expressed
the invitation--
Mr. He-Man from College!
This is You!
Say! what do you think? The real old He-Boys of 1891 are going to
gather in for a feed at the Queen's on February 5th. Songs!
Speeches! Fireworks! And who do you think is going to be the main
Big Talk! You'd never guess--why old Prof Baxter--old nutsey
Baxter! Come and hear him. Come along right now! The whole feed--
songs, fun and smokes included--is only six bucks. So get down in
your pants and fork them out.
Yours, Attaboy! Hooroo!
Rev. John Smith,
(Canon of the Cathedral)
An Attaboy Dictionary
Let it be noted that the great point of the Attaboy system is the
terrific desire for emphasis. A man is not called a man. He is
called a he-man. Even that is not enough. He has to be 100 per
cent he-man. And in extreme cases he must be called a "100 per
cent, full blooded, bull-chested, big-headed, great-hearted man,"--
all of this to replace the simple old-fashioned word gentleman.
Indeed, one could write quite a little dictionary of Attaboy terms
like this--
Gentleman--(See above.)
Lady--a big-hearted, wide-eyed, warm-chested woman, a hundred per
cent soul, and built square.
Friend--a he-man with a hand-grip and a jaw that means that as soon
as you see him in front of you, you know that he is back of you.
Senator--far-sighted, frog-eyed, nation-making he-man.
Criminal--no such word. Try "hold-up man"--"yegg"--"thug"--"expert
safe-cracker," etc., etc., etc.
In the same way when the attaboy language turns from the nouns to
the verbs there has to be the same vital emphasis. The fatal step
was taken when someone invented the word punch. Since then every
form of action has to be described as if it occurred with a direct
physical shock. A speaker has got to hit his audience with a
punch, he must lift them, throw them, in short fairly kick them out
of the room.
A book is said to be arresting, gripping, compelling. It has got
to hold the reader down so that he can't get up. A preacher has
got to be vital, dynamic; he must put his sermon over; he must
pitch it at the audience; in short, preaching becomes a form of
baseball with the clergyman in the box.
In other words the whole of our life and thought has got to be
restated in terms of moving things, in terms of electricity, radio
and all the crackling physical apparatus of the world in which we
live.
Macaulay and Gibbon in Attaboy
It is quite clear that if this attaboy tendency goes on all the
books of the past will have to be rewritten or nobody will
understand them. Somebody will have to re-edit them so as to put
into them the necessary "pep" and "punch" to make them readable by
the next generation.
We can imagine how completely unintelligible will be the stately
pages of such dignified writers as Macaulay or Gibbon. Here, for
example, is a specimen of the way in which Gibbon's Decline and
Fall of the Roman Empire will be revised. I take as an
illustration a well-known passage describing the action of a heroic
matron of Rome in rallying the wavering citizens after a retreat.
It runs:
"A Roman matron of imposing appearance and striking countenance
stepped forth before the hesitating citizens--"
Translation:
"A pre-war blonde who was evidently a real peach skipped out in
front of the bunch--"
"At the sight of her the citizens paused--"
Translation:
"As soon as they put their lamps on her all the guys stood still--"
"Reluctant cries of admiration arose from the crowd--"
"'Some doll!' said the boys."
"'Cowards!' she exclaimed."
"'You big stiffs,' she snorted."
"'And would you leave the defense of your homes at such a time as
this!'"
"'Do you mean to say that you are going to fly the coop?'"
"'To your posts all of you!' she cried."
"'Beat it,' she honked."
"Inspired by her courage the citizens with shouts of 'Long Live
Sempronia!' rushed to the ramparts."
"Full of pep they all shouted, 'Attaboy, Lizzie!' and skipped up
the ladders."
Rome was Saved
Epitaph on an Attaboy
Even the epitaphs on the grave stones will have to be altered. The
old style used to run, "Here lies the body of John Smith, who was
born on February 1, 1802 and departed this life on December 1,
1861. He was a loving son, a fond parent, a devoted husband and a
patriotic citizen. This stone has been erected by his mourning
widow to commemorate his many virtues and in the expectation of his
resurrection."
But that kind of thing will have to be replaced by an epitaph with
more "punch" in it, something more "gripping," more compelling.
Try this:
"Mr. Passerby! Stop! This is for you--you careless HOG.
"Read it.
"Here lies a cuckoo, John Smith, one of the real boys. He opened
his lamps first on February 1, 1802. He stepped off the big plank
into the dark stuff on December 1, 1861--But when the big Horn
calls 'ALL UP,' oh, say, ATTABOY!"
The Crossword Puzzle Craze
"I beg your pardon," said a man sitting opposite to me in the
smoking end of a Pullman car. "Do you happen to know the name of
an Arabian Feudal Ruler in five letters?"
"Yes," I said, "a sheik."
He wrote down the word in a notebook that was spread out upon his
knee. Then he said,
"And what's the Hottentot house on the move in five letters?"
"A Kraal," I answered.
"Oh--yes, Kraal!" he said. "I could only think of a bungalow; and
here's another that's a regular bowler, what is an extinct
graminiferous lizard in thirteen letters?"
"Ichthyosaurus," I said.
"How's that?" he asked. "My, I wish I'd had a college education--
let me write it down--wait now--I-c-h-t--say, I believe it's going
to get it--yes, sir, it's getting it--By Gee! It's got it. It all
fits in now except there's a dirty little hitch in this corner.
Say, could there be any word in three letters that would be e-k-e?"
"Yes," I said, "'eke,' it means 'also.'"
"Then I've got the whole thing--just in time--here's my station.
Say, I'm ever so much obliged. I guess I will have one on the wife
when I show her this. That's a peach, that ichthy-what d'ye call
it. Good-bye."
He left me and I knew that I had been dealing with another of the
new victims of the crossword puzzle mania. I knew that as soon as
he got into his house he would work the ichthyosaurus on his wife;
indeed he would probably find her seated with a paper and pencil
trying to figure out whether the Icelandish skol will fit in with a
form of religion called "Tosh." The thing generally runs in
families.
This crossword puzzle is said to have originated in Tibet. From
there it was transferred to the Mongolians who introduced it to the
Hairy Ainus of Japan, who were delighted with it, as they naturally
would be. From them it crossed the ocean to the Siwash Indians who
passed it on to the Dog Ribs and to the Flat Heads, and in this way
it got to the American Colleges.
The mania has now assumed international dimensions. It is
estimated that if the crossword puzzle solvers were stood up in
line (either horizontally or vertically, they wouldn't care which),
they would reach half way to Havana. Some might even get there.
But the greatest thing about the crossword puzzle is the way in
which it is brightening up our language. Old words that had been
forgotten for five hundred years are being polished up as bright as
new. A man no longer says, "Good morning. How are you?" he says,
"Good morn. How fare you?" And the other man answers that he
feels yardly and eke his wife, especially as they expect eft soon
to take a holy day and make a cast to Atlantic City.
Before this thing began there were lots of people so ignorant that
they didn't know what "Yost" meant, or what a "farrago" is, or
which part of a dog is its "withers." Now these are family words.
Anyone would say quite naturally, "Just give that dog a kick in the
farrago and put him out."
I notice especially the general improvement in exact knowledge for
the names of animals and parts of animals. Who used to know what a
marsupial was? Who could have told where the dewlap of an ox is?
How many people had heard of the carapace of the mud turtle, or
knew how to give a proper name to the east ear of an elephant?
Many crossword puzzle experts go further. When engaged in
conversation they don't even need to use the very words they mean.
They merely indicate them in crossword puzzle fashion and the
expert listening to them can solve their conversation at once.
Here is a sample of the new--
Crossword Puzzle Conversation
"Good morning, Short-for-Peter."
"Hullo, Diminutive-of-William. How do you experience-a-sensation
in four letters this morning?"
"Worse than a word in four letters rhyming with bell and tell."
"Oh, I am sorry to hear it. What is the substance, body or cubic
content of space in six letters with you?"
"Cold in the bronchial tunnels, passages, or English name for a
subway."
"Possessing or exhibiting grace with the personal adjective! Who
is treating you?"
"Only the woman in four letters bound to me by law for life!"
"Indeed! Surely you ought not to be an adverb in three letters in
this weather."
"No, I ought to be a preposition in two. But I have to go to my
effort, energy or mental or bodily exertion undertaken for gain in
four letters."
"Well, take good care of yourself. Good remain with you as a form
of exclamation used in parting in seven letters."
There are evidently large possibilities in this form of speech. I
think that a lot of our literature could be brightened up with the
words of romance and mystery by putting it into crossword puzzle
language.
Crossword Poetry
Even our poetry would be none the worse for it. Here, for example,
is a once familiar bit of Longfellow's verse turned into this kind
of dialect:
Under the spreading chestnut tree,
The village smithy remains erect, upright or in a vertical
position common to man and the apes but not seen in other
animals,
The smith, a mighty man, is a personal pronoun
With large and sinuous extremities of his limbs in four letters,
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are as strong as a company of musicians.
Admirable! Isn't it? It only needs a little industry and we can
have the whole of our classical literature translated in this way.
But unfortunately the results of the new craze are not always so
happy. I heard last week of a rather distressing case of the ill
effects of puzzle solving. A man of my acquaintance was at an
evening party where they were solving crossword puzzles and he was
brought, with the rest of the company, to an absolute full stop by
one item: what would you rather be out of than in, in twelve
letters? The thing absolutely beat him.
He thought of it all night but with no result. He was still
thinking of it as he drove his car down town next morning. In his
absolute preoccupation he ran into a man on the street and shook
him up quite badly. He was arrested and tried for criminal
negligence.
The judge said to him: "I regret very much to have to impose a
prison sentence on a man of your standing. But criminal negligence
cannot be tolerated. I sentence you to six months in the
penitentiary."
On this the puzzle-solver threw up his hands with an exclamation of
joy and cried, "Penitentiary, of course, penitentiary! Now I've
got it!"
He was scribbling on a little bit of paper when they led him away.
Information While You Eat
Some Reflections on the Joys of the Luncheon Clubs
Now that the bright tints of autumn are appearing on the trees, the
season for the luncheon clubs is opening up again. Personally I
think our luncheon clubs are one of the most agreeable features of
modern city life. I have belonged to several luncheon clubs in our
town ever since they started, and I never miss a lunch.
When I look back to the time when men used to be satisfied to sit
down all alone in front of a beefsteak and a bottle of Budweiser
with only just some apple pie and a cup of coffee and a cigar after
it, and without singing a note all through--I don't see how we did
it. Now, if I can't sing a little as I eat, and call "hear, hear"
every now and then, I don't feel as if I could digest properly. So
when I offer a few suggestions about our luncheon clubs, I don't
want to be misunderstood. I am not criticizing but merely pointing
out how we can make them brighter and better still.
Take the singing. After all, quite frankly, do we need to sing
at lunch? Our clubs--and, I think, the clubs in most other towns,
too--generally sing very slow, dragging melodies such as,
"The . . . day . . . is . . . past, . . . the . . . sun . . .
is . . . set. . . ." The effect of that kind of tune as intoned
by a hundred men with a pound and a quarter beefsteak adjusted in
each of them (125 lbs. total dead-weight of music) is, very frankly
mournful. It sounds to me like the last of the Tasmanian Islanders
leaving home.
Or else we sing Negro melodies. But why should we? Or we sing
"Annie Laurie." Who was she, anyway? In fact, to be quite candid,
I can eat lunch splendidly without asking to be carried back to
Tennessee, or offering to lay down and die, either on the banks of
the Doon or anywhere else.
Without the singing there could be a pleasant atmosphere of quiet
which is now missing.
Take as another slight point of criticism the chairman's speech,
introducing the speaker. There I do think a decided improvement
could be made by cutting out the chairman's remarks altogether.
They are misleading. He doesn't state things as they are. He
always says:
"Today we are to have a rare treat in listening to Mr. Nut. I need
not offer any introduction to this audience for a man like Mr. Nut.
When we learned that Mr. Nut was to address us, we felt that the
club was fortunate indeed."
Now if the man told the truth what he would say would be this:
"Gentlemen, I am sorry to announce that the only speaker we have
been able to secure for today is this poor simp who is sitting
beside me, Mr. Nut. You never heard of him before, gentlemen, but
then neither did your committee. But we have hunted everywhere for
a speaker, and we simply can't get any except this guy that you see
here. He is going to talk to you on 'Our Trade Relations with
Nicaragua.'
"I am well aware, gentlemen, that this subject seems utterly
without interest. But it appears to be the only subject about
which this poor shrimp knows anything. So I won't say any more--
I'll let you judge for yourselves what you are going to get. Mr.
Nut."
Then, of course, there is the vital question of whether, after all,
a luncheon club needs to listen to speeches. Could it not perhaps
fulfill its functions just as well if there was no address at all?
The trouble is that one never gets time to study up the question
beforehand and the recollection that is carried away by what the
speaker said is too vague to be of any use.
I will give as an example my own recollection, as far as it goes,
of the address that we had at our club last week, to which I have
just referred, on the subject of our "Trade Relations with
Nicaragua."
Let me say at the start that I am not quite clear whether it was
Nicaragua or Nigeria. The chairman seemed to say Nicaragua, but I
understood the speaker once or twice to say Nigeria.
I tried to find out afterwards from other members of the club
whether it was Nigeria or Nicaragua. But they didn't seem to care.
They hear so many people lecture on so many queer places that it
runs off them like water. Only a few meetings before they had
heard a man talk on "Six Weeks in Bangkok," and right after that
another man on "Seven Weeks in Pongo Pongo" and the very next week
after that the address was called "Eight Weeks in Itchi-Itchi."
But let it go at Nicaragua, because it is really just about the
same. Before the speaker began to say anything about Nicaragua
itself, or Nigeria itself as the case may be, he went through a
sort of introduction. All the speakers seem to go over about the
same ground in beginning. I tried to write this particular
introduction down from memory but I am not sure that I have it
correctly. It seemed to run as follows:
"I feel very much honored in being asked to address this club. It
is an honor to address this club. And I feel that addressing this
club is an honor. When I was invited to address this club I tried
to think what I could address this club about. In fact I felt very
much like the old darky. This old darky--" Here follows the story
of an old darky, which has been told to our club already by six
explorers, seven professors, and two clergymen.
It will just about stand repeating in print, but not quite. We
always know that when the speaker looks round and says, "There was
an old darky--" we are going to get it again. Some of the members
can still laugh at it.
But even leaving out the introduction, there are other troubles.
The addresses are, no doubt, full of information. But you can't
get it. There's too much of it. You can't hold it. Here is what
I got, listening as hard as I could, from the address of which I am
speaking.
"Probably very few of us realize what a vast country Nicaragua, or
Nigeria, is. It extends from latitude (I didn't catch it) to
latitude--I'm not quite sure, and it contains a quarter of a
million or half a billion square miles. The principal product is
either logwood or dogwood--it may have been deadwood. Sugar either
grows excellently or doesn't grow at all--I didn't quite catch
which.
"The inhabitants are either the mildest or the wildest race known on
the globe. They are polygamous and sell their wives freely to
travelers for a few glass beads (we all heard that as plainly as
anything). The whole of the interior of Nigeria or Nicaragua is
dense mud. All that Nicaragua or Nigeria needs is richer soil, a
better climate, a decent population, money, civilization, women,
and enterprise."
So upon the whole, I am much inclined to doubt whether the speeches
are worth while. It is so hard to carry away anything.
And anyway, having speeches means getting too big a crowd. A
hundred men is too many. A group of fifty would be far better.
As a matter of fact, a more compact luncheon of, say, twenty would
be better still. Twenty men around a table can all converse, they
can feel themselves in actual personal contact with one another.
With twenty men, or say, fifteen men, you feel you are among a
group of friends. In fact, I am not sure but what ten, or eight,
would be a cosier crowd still.
You get eight or six men together and you can really exchange
ideas. You get a real mental friction with six men that you can't
get with a large number. And moreover with six, or four, men
sitting down like this day after day you get to know one another
and in point of service and comfort there is no comparison.
You can have a luncheon served for four, or three, men that is
really worth eating. As a matter of fact, if it comes to that, two
is a better number still.
Indeed the more I think of it the better I like two--myself and a
darned good waiter.
The Children's Column
As Brought Up To Date
I suppose that everybody who reads the newspapers is aware of the
change that is coming over the thing called the Children's Column,
or the Children's Corner, or the Children's Page. Forty years ago
it was made up of such things as letters to little boys about how
to keep white mice, and letters to little girls about making
crochet work in six stitches. But now, what with the radio and
progress and the general rapid movement of the age, it is quite
different. Here are some samples that are meant to illustrate the
change.
Anno Domini 1880
Letter to little Willie Weakhead telling him how to make a Rabbit
Hutch.
DEAR WILLIE:
So you want to know how to make a rabbit hutch for your white
rabbit? Well, it is not very difficult if you will follow the
directions carefully. Get from the nearest joiner a large empty
box and some boards about 4 inches wide. (You know what an inch
is, do you not?) Then lay the boards across the open side of the
box with a space of about two inches between each and nail them in
this position. Good nails can be bought in any drugstore but see
that you are given ones with good points on them.
If you find it hard to nail on the boards, get your father or your
uncle to help you. Be careful in using the hammer not to hit
yourself on the thumb, as a blow with a hammer on the thumb is
painful and is often followed by a blow on the fingers. Remember,
if it starts to rain while you are working on your hutch, come in
out of the wet.
Let us know how you get on and whether your bunnies like their new
home.
Your's etc.
UNCLE TOBY (Editor: Children's Column)
But contrast with this the modern thing which in these days of
radio and modern science has taken the place of the rabbit hutch
correspondence.
Anno Domini 1926
Letter from the Editor to little Willie Wisebean, grandson of the
above, in regard to the difficulties which he is finding with his
radio apparatus.
DEAR WILLIE:
You write that the other night in attempting to call up Arizona KQW
on your radio, you found an inordinate amount of static on your
antennae. We quite agree with you that the trouble was perhaps due
to purely atmospheric conditions causing a fall in the potential.
You can easily find out if this is the case by calculating the
differential wave length shown by your variometer.
As you rightly say your apparatus may have been put out of order by
your allowing your father and your grandfather into your workshop.
If you are wise you will keep them out. As you say yourself, they
are too old to learn and they may meet some injury in handling your
machine. You say that your grandfather used to be very fond of
carpentry and once made a rabbit hutch. Why not let him set to
work now and make a rabbit hutch to put your father in?
By the way, if it turns out that your trouble is in your magnetic
coils, we advise you not to try to remedy them but to buy new ones.
You can get excellent coils from Messrs. Grabb and Gettit, for $100
a coil, or even more. On this your father might come in useful.
With thanks for your interesting letter,
PROFESSOR I. KNOWIT, Ph.D. T.K., D.F.
Oxon, Harvard, Oklahoma.
Or let us turn to another part of the same field--the feminine
side. The change is even more striking. Compare the two following
letters to the Lady Editor, making enquiries in each case about the
way to arrange a children's party for little girls.
Anno Domini 1880
Letter to Dollie Dollhouse, aged 14, who has asked for advice about
a party.
DEAR DOLLIE:
I am so glad to hear that you are going to give a party to your
little girl friends for your fourteenth birthday. Of course you
must have strawberries, great big luscious ones with lots of cream
all over them. And of course you must have a lovely big cake, with
icing all over the top of it, and you must put fourteen candles on
it. Do you see the idea of the candles, dear? No, perhaps not at
first, but if you will think a minute you will see it. It means
that you are fourteen years old and that there is a candle for
every year. Isn't it a pretty thought, once you understand it? I
got it out of an old Norwegian book of fairy stories and thought it
so sweet.
You had better not try to light the candles yourself, but get your
papa or your mama to come and do it, if they do not like to, then
send for a man from the hardware store.
You say that after all the girls have eaten all they can you would
like to have some games and ask what you can play. There are
really such a lot of games that it is hard to advise, but among the
best of the new games is one called Hunt the Slipper, which I am
sure you would like. All that you need for playing it with is an
old slipper, one without any tacks sticking out of it being the
best. One of the girls sits on the slipper and then the player who
is chosen to begin has to go round and roll over all the girls and
see where the slipper is. You see it is quite a clever game and
can easily be learned in half an hour. But remember that your play
must never be rough. In rolling over the girls pick them up by the
feet and roll them over in a ladylike way.
After the game if you can get your papa to come into the room and
read a selection of poetry, such as a couple of cantos from
Paradise Lost, the girls will go away delighted. With best love
and good wishes for your party,
AUNT AGATHA
Lady Editor Children's Column.
Here is the other sample which is the same thing, brought up to
date.
Anno Domini 1926
Letter to Flossie Fitz Clippit, aged 14, granddaughter of Dollie
Dollhouse, in answer to her request for advice about a party.
DEAR FLOSSIE:
The right number of covers for a luncheon to your girl friends is
certainly eight. Ten, as you yourself seem to think, is too large
a number to be cosy, while eight gives exactly the feeling of
cameraderie without too much formality. Six, on the other hand, is
a little too intime, while seven rather carries the idea of oddity,
of something a little louche, or at least gauche, if not hootch.
For table decorations I find it hard to advise you, as I do not
know the tinting of your room, nor the draperies or the shape and
shade of your table and the complexion of your butler. But if not
unsuitable for some special reason what do you say to great bunches
of scarlet ilex thrown all over the table? Either that or large
masses of wisteria and big bunches of Timothy hay?
I don't think that if I were you I would serve cocktails before
lunch, as some of your friends might have views about it, but a
delicious coupe can be made by mixing half a bottle of old rum with
shredded wheat and then soaking it in gin.
For the menu, you will want something light and dainty, appealing
rather by its exquisite taste than by sheer quantity. What do you
say to beginning with a canapé of paté de fois gras, followed by a
puré of mushrooms and leading up to a broiled lobster followed by a
porterhouse beefsteak. I think that is the kind of thing your
little friends would like. And if you have after it a soufflé, and
a few quarts of ice cream with angel cake it will be found quite
enough.
I quite sympathize with what you say about not wanting your mother.
There is no doubt that the presence of a mother at any kind of
entertainment gives a touch of coldness, a lack of affection. Your
father, of course, is quite impossible; though I think it would be
all right to let him shake hands with the girls as they pass out.
At a recent luncheon where I was present I saw both the father and
the mother brought into the drawing room for a few moments and
introduced to the guests. The effect was really very sweet, with
quite an old world touch to it. But I would not try to imitate it
if I were you. Better be content with having the butler take up
half a gallon of the coupe to your father in his library.
You will of course want to know about cigarettes. I should
particularly recommend the new Egyptian Dingos, or, if you have not
yet tried them, the new Peruvian Guanos. They seem to be the last
word in tobacco.
With regards and good wishes,
Man-Lady Editor
Children's Adult Column.
Old Proverbs Made New
It has occurred to me that somebody in one of the English
departments of our colleges ought to get busy and re-write our
national proverbs. They are all out of date. They don't fit any
longer. Indeed, many of them are precisely the converse of
existing facts.
Our proverbs have come down to us from the days of long ago; days
when the world was very primitive and very simple and very
different; when people never moved more than a mile and a half from
home and were all afraid of the dark; and when wisdom was handed
out by old men with white whiskers called PROPHETS, every one of
whom would be "retired" nowadays by any first class board of
trustees as past the age-limit of common sense.
But in those days all the things that were said by these wise old
men, who had never seen a motor car, were gathered up and called
proverbs and repeated by all the common people as the last words of
wisdom. The result is that even today we still go on repeating
them, without realizing how hopelessly they are off the track.
Take as a first sample the proverb that is perhaps the best known
in our language:
Birds of a Feather Flock Together
But they don't. Ask any first class naturalist. If the wise old
men had taken another look they would have seen that the last thing
birds ever want to do is to flock together. In ninety-nine cases
out of a hundred they keep away from their own species, and only
flock when it is absolutely necessary. So much for the birds. But
the proverb is really supposed to refer to people and then it is
wrong again. People "of a feather" do not flock together. Tall
men fall in love with little women. A girl with a beautiful fair
skin and red hair marries a man who looks like a reformed orang-
outang. A clergyman makes a friend of an auctioneer and a banker
would rather spend a day with an Adirondack fishing guide than with
a whole vaultful of bankers. Burglars during the daytime go and
swim in the Y.M.C.A. pool. Forgers in their off time sing in the
choir, and choirmasters when they are not singing shoot craps.
In short, there is nothing in the proverb whatsoever. It ought to
be revised under the modern conditions to read:
Birds of any particular feather and persons of any particular
character or occupation show upon the whole a disposition rather to
seek out something dissimilar to their own appearance and nature to
consort with something homologous to their own essential entity.
In that shape one has a neat workable proverb. Try another:
A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss
Entirely wrong again. This was supposed to show that a young man
who wandered from home never got on in the world. In very ancient
days it was true. The young man who stayed at home and worked hard
and tilled the ground and goaded oxen with a long stick like a
lance found himself as he grew old a man of property, owning four
goats and a sow. The son who wandered forth in the world was
either killed by the cannibals or crawled home years afterwards
doubled up with rheumatism. So the old men made the proverb. But
nowadays it is exactly wrong. It is the rolling stone that gathers
the moss. It is the ambitious boy from Honkville, Indiana, who
trudges off to the city leaving his elder brother in the barnyard
and who later makes a fortune and founds a university. While his
elder brother still has only the old farm with three cows and a
couple of pigs, he has a whole department of agriculture with great
sheds-full of Tamworth hogs and a professor to every six of them.
In short, in modern life it is the rolling stone that gathers the
moss. And the geologists--outside of Tennessee--say that the moss
on the actual stone was first started in exactly the same way. It
was the rolling of the stone that smashed up the earth and made the
moss grow.
Take another proverb:
All is not Gold that Glitters
How perfectly ridiculous! Everybody in the days in which we live
knows--even a child knows--that all IS gold that glitters. Put on
clothes enough, appearance enough and you will be accepted
anywhere. Just do a little glittering and everybody will think you
are gold. Make a show, be a humbug, and you will succeed so fast
that presently, being very wealthy and prominent, you will really
think yourself a person of great merit and intellect. In other
words, the glitter makes the gold. That is all there IS to it.
Gold is really one of the most useless of all material objects.
Even now we have found no REAL use for it, except to fill our
teeth. Any other employment of it is just GLITTER. So the proverb
might be revised to read:
Every thing or person may be said to stand in high esteem and to
pass at a high value provided that it or he makes a sufficient
show, glitter, or appearance, the estimation being in inverse ratio
to the true quantitative measurement of the reality of it, them or
her. That makes a neat workable proverb, expressed with up-to-date
accuracy.
Or here is another famous proverb that is exactly the contrary of
truth:
People Who Live in Glass Houses Ought Not to Throw Stones
Not at all. They are the very people who ought to throw stones and
to keep on throwing them all the time. They ought to keep up such
a fusillade of stones from their glass house that no one can get
near it.
Or if the proverb is taken to mean that people who have faults of
their own ought not to talk of other people's faults, it is equally
mistaken. They ought to talk of other people's faults all the time
so as to keep attention away from their own.
But the list of proverbs is so long that it is impossible to do
more than make a casual mention of a few others.
One Swallow Does Not Make a Summer
Perhaps not. But there are ever so many occasions when one
swallow--just one single swallow--is better than nothing to drink
at all. And if you get enough of them they DO make a summer.
Charity Begins at Home
Perfectly ridiculous. Watch any modern city householder when a
beggar comes to his door. Charity begins with the Federated
Charities Office, or with the Out of Work Mission, or with the City
Hall, or if need be, with the Police Court--in short, ANYWHERE but
at home. Our whole effort is now to keep charity as far from home
as possible.
It is a Wise Child that knows its Own Father
Not at all. Alter this and make it read: It is a very silly boy
who isn't on to his old man.
Even a Worm Will Turn at Last
Wrong. It turns at once, immediately. It never waits.
A Bird in the Hand is Worth Two in the Bush
Yes, but a bird in a good restaurant is worth ten of either of
them.
There--that's enough. Any reader of this book may go on having fun
with the other proverbs. I give them to him.
IV
In the Good Old Summertime
The Merry Month of May
As Treated in the Bye-Gone Almanacs
The part of the year known in ballad poetry as the Good Old Summer
Time begins with what is popularly called the Merry Month of May.
The winter is then over except in the City of Quebec, in Butte,
Montana, and in the Back Bay regions of Boston. The gathering
warmth of the sun calls all nature to life.
The Heavens in May
In the older almanacs of the kind that used to be made for farmers,
the first items under this month always dealt with the aspect of
the heavens. The farmer was told that in May the sun, passing out
of the sign of Taurus, moved into the constellation of Gemini; that
the apparent declination of the sun was 15 degrees and 4 minutes
and that the neap tides fell on the thirteenth and twenty-seventh
of the month. He was also informed that Mars and Mercury during
May are both in opposition and that Sirius is the dog star.
In the city this information is now useless. Nobody can see the
heavens even if he wants to; the open space between the skyscrapers
formerly called the sky is now filled with electric lights,
pictures of motor wheels turning round, and men eating breakfast
food with a moving spoon.
We doubt also if the up-to-date farmer is really concerned with the
Zodiac. We will therefore only say that in this month if the
farmer will on any clear night ascend to the cupola of his pergola
with his binoculars and with his radio plug in his ears and his
insulators on his feet and view the heavens from midnight till
three in the morning, he will run a first class chance of getting
pneumonia.
The Garden in May
For those to whom gardening--even in the limited restrictions of a
city back yard--is a hobby and a passion, the month of May is the
most enticing month of the year. It seems strange to think that so
many men with a back yard at their disposal--a back yard let us
say, twenty feet by fifteen--should nevertheless spend the long
evenings and the Saturday afternoons of the month of May striding
up and down the golf links or wandering along a trout stream. How
much better to be out in the