The Daily Worker Newspaper, February 9, 1924, Page 8

THE CITY OF DREADFUL NIGHT = - - parks— ’twas for all the world like | 66 URING the recent warmed- over spell,” said my friend, Carney, driver of express wagon No. 8,606, “a good many opportunities was had of observing human nature thru peekaboo waists. “The Park Commissioner and Com- missioner of Polis and the Forestry Commission gets together and agrees to let the people sleep in the parks until the Weather Bureau gets the thermometer down again to a living basis. So they draws up open-air resolutions and has them O. K.’d by the Secretary of Agriculture, Mr. Comstock and the Village Improve- ment Mosquito Exterminating So- ciety of South Orange, N. J. “When the _ proclamation made opening up to the people by special grant, the public parks that belong to ’em, there was a general exodus into Central Park by the com- munities existing along its borders. In ten minutes after sun-down you’d have thought that there was an un- dress rehearsal of a potato famine | toorn be night. a ukase of them Russians—— ’twill be heard from again at the next elec- tion time. “Well, then, Officer Reagan drives the whole lot of us to the park and turns us in the nearest gate. ’Tis dark under the trees, and all the childher sets up to howling that they want to go home. ’ “*Ye'll pass the night in this stretch of woods and scenery,’ says Officer Reagan. ‘’Twill be fine and imprisonment for insoolting the Park Commissioner and the Chief of the Weather Bureau if ye refuse. I’m in charge of thirty acres between here and the Agyptian Monument, | jdenomination of mosquitos, By O. HENRY “Me man,’ says he, ‘can you tell airshaft,’ says Patsey Rourke, ‘and me why all these people are lyin a-perspiring in me own windy to the around on the grass in the park. { ‘joyful noise of the passing trains | thought it was against the rules,’ “‘*A&-playing of my flute into the | and the smell of liver and onions and; “‘’Twas an ordinance,’ says I, a-reading of the latest murder in the | ‘just pased by the Polis Department smoke of the cooking is well enough jand ratified by the Turf Cutters’ As- for me,’ says he. ‘What is this herd-jsociation, providing that all persons ing us in the grass for, not to men- | not carrying licenfe number on their tion the crawling things with legs|rear axles shall keep in the pubile that walk up the trousers of us, and parks until further notice. Fortu- the Jersey snipes that peck at us, masquerading under the name and What is it all for, Carney, and the rint going on just the same over at the flats?’ “Tis the great annual Municipal land I advise ye to give no trouble. | Pree Night Outing Lawn Party,’ was|’Tis sleeping on the grass yez all have been condemned to by the au- thorities. Yez’ll be permitted to \leave in the morning, but ye must re- Me orders was silent on the subject of bail, but I'll ‘find out if ’tis required and there’ll |be bondsmen at the gate.’ “There being no lights except in Irel iahi along the automobile drives, us 179 . n Ireland and a Kishineff massacre. tenants of tha Beersheba Flats pre- | the hay fever and the rheumatism, They come by families, gangs, clam- bake societies, clans, clubs, and tribes from all sides to enjoy a cool sleep on the grass. TRem that didn’t have oil stoves, brought along plenty of blankets, so as not to be upset with the cold and discomforts of sleeping outdoors. By building fires of the shade trees and huddling together in the bridle paths, and burrowing under the grass where the ground was soft enough, the likes of 5,000 head of people successfully battled against the night air in Central Park alone. “You know I live in the elegant furnished apartment house called the Beersheba Flats, over against the elevated portion of the New York Central Railroad. “When the order come to the flats that all hands must turn out and sleep in the park, according to the instructions of the consulting com- mittee of the City Club and the Murphy Draying, Returfing and Sodding Company, there was a look of a couple of fires and an eviction all over the place, “The tenants began to pack up feather beds, rubber boots, strings of garlic, hot-water bags, portable canoes and scuttles of coal to take along for the sake of comfort. The sidewalk looked like a Russian camp in Oyama’s line of march. There was wailing and lamenting up and down stairs from Danny Geoghegan’s flat on the top floor to the apart- ments of Misses Goldsteinupski on the first. “For why,’ says Danny, coming down and raging in his biue yarn socks to the janitor, ‘should I be turned out of me comfortable apart- mints to lay in the dirty grass like a rabbit? ’Tis like Jerome to stir up trouble wid small matters like this instead of—’ “‘Whist!’ says Officer Reagan on the sidewalk, rapping with his club. ’Tis not Jerome. ’Tis by order of the Polis Commissioner. Turn out every one of yez and hike yerselves to the park.’ “Now, ’twas a peaceful and happy home that all of us had in them same Beersheba Flats. The O’Dowds and Steiowitves and th: alinhans and the Cohens and the Spizzinellis and the McManuses and the Spiegel- mayers and the Joneses—all the na- tion of us, we lived like one big family together. And when the hot nights come along we kept a line of childher reaching from the front door to Kelly’s on the corner, passing along the cans of beer from one to another without the trouble of run- | pared to spend the night as best we jeould in the raging forest. Them says I, ‘given by the polis, Hetty: Green and the Drug Trust. During the heated season they hold a week of it in the principal parks. ‘Tis a _scheme to reach that portion of the jpeople that’s not worth taking up to North Beach for a fish fry.’ “T can’t sleep on the ground,’ says Patsey, ‘wid any benefit. I have and me ear is full of ants.’ “Well, the night goes on, and the | ithat brought blankets and kindling |€x-tenants of the Flats groans and tS Discouragement. jfwood was best off. They got fires started and wrapped the blankets round their heads and laid down, cursing, in the grass. There was nothin;{ to pee, nothing! to drink, noth- ing to do. In the dark we had no ning after it. And with no more | way of telling friend or foe, except clothing on than is provided for in|by feeling the nose of ’em. the statutes, sitting in all the win-|brought along me last winter over- dies, with a cool growler in every|coat, me tooth-brush, some quinine one, and your feet out in the air,' pills and the red quilt off the bed and the Rosenstein girls singing on in me flat. Three times during the the fire escape of the sixth floor, and night somebody rolled on me quilt Patsy Rourke’s flute going in the and struck his knees against the eighth, and the ladies calling each|Adam’s apple of me. And three other synonyms out of the windies, | times I judged his character by run- and now and then a breeze sailin in over Mister Depew’s Central—) tell you the Beersheba Flats was a summer resort that made the Cat-. skills look like a hole in the ground. With his person full of beer and his feet out the windy and his old wo- man frying pork chops or ” rn! coal furnace and the childher danc- ing in cotton slins on the sidewel!: around the organ-grinder and the! rent paid for a week-—what does a man want better on a hot night than that? And then comes this ruling of the polis driving people out o’ their comfortable homes to sleep in ning me hand over his face, and three time I rose and kicked the intruder down the hill to the gravelly walk below. And then some one ‘with a flavor of Kelly’s whiskey snuggled to me, and I found his ,nose turned up the right way, and I says: ‘Is that you, then, Patsey?’ and he says, ‘It is, Carney. How long do you think it’ll last?’ “I'm no weather-prophet,’ says 1, ‘but if they bring out a strong anti- Tammany ticket next fall it ought to get us home in time to sleep on a bed once or twice before they line us up at the polls, pee in the same religion. stumbles around in the dark, trying to find rest and recreation in the forest. The childher is screaming }) with the coldness, and the janitor makes hot tea for ’em and keeps the fires going with the signboards that point to the Tavern and the Casino. -1The tenants try to lay down on the grass by families in the dart, but you’re lucky if you can sleep next to a man from the same floor or pe- Now and then a Murphy, accidental, rolls lover on the grass of a Rosenstein, { or a Cohen tries to crawl under the |O’Grady bush, and then there’s a ‘feeling of noses and somebody is | ‘rolled down the hill to the driveway and stays there. There is some hair- pulling among the women folks, and l everybody spanks the nearest how- tonio Spizzinelli. ling kid to him by the sense of feel- ing only, regardless of its parentage and ownership. ‘Tis hard to keep up the social distinctions in the dark that flourish by daylight in the Beersheba Flats. Mrs, Rafferty, that despises the asphalt that a Dago treads on, wakes up in the morning with her feet in the bosom of An- And Mike O’- Dowd, that always threw peddlers downstairs as fast as he came upon *em, has to unwind old Isaacstein’s whiskers from around his neck, and wake up the whole gang at daylight. But here and there some few got ac- quainted and overlooked the discom- \forts of the elements. There was five Reames sae to be married an- os at the flats the next morn- ing. “About midnight I gets up and wrings the dew out of my hair, and goes to the side of the driveway and sits down. At one side of the park I could see the lights in the streets and houses; and I was thinking how happy them folks was, who could chase the duck and smoke their pipes at their windows, and keep cool and pleasant like nature intended for ‘em to. “Just then an automobile stops by me, and a fine-looking, well-dressed man steps out, The Fate of nately, the orders comes this year, during a spell of fine weather, and the mortality, except on the borders of the lake and along the automobile drives, will not be any greater than usual.’ “*Who are these people on the side of the hill?’ asks the man. “‘Sure,’ says I, ‘none others than the tenants of the Beersheba Flats— a fine home for any man, especially on a hot night. May daylight come soon!’ | “They come here be night,’ says he, ‘and breathe in the pure air and the fragrance of the flowers and trees. They do that,’ says he, €om- ing every night from the burning heat of dwellings of brick and stone.’ “‘And wood,’ says I, ‘And marble and plaster and iron.’ “‘The matter will be attended to at once,’ says the man, putting up his ook. “ ‘T own the Beersheba Flats,’ says he. ‘God bless the grass and the trees that give extra benefits to a man’s tenants. The rents shall be raised fifteen per cent tomorrow. Good-night,’ says he.” DAISY FRASER By EDGAR LEE MASTERS Did you ever hear of Editor Whedon Giving to the public treasury of the money he received For supporting candidates for office? Or for writing up the canning factory To get people to invest? Or for suppressing the facts about the bank, When it was rotten and ready to break? Did you ever hear of the Circuit _, Judge Helping anyone except the “Q” rail- road, Or the bankers? Or did Rev. Peet or | Rev. Sibley | Give any part of their salary, earned by keeping still, | Or speaking out as the leaders wished | them to do iTo the building of the water works? But I—Daisy Fraser, who always passed Along the streets thru rows of nods and smi smiles, And coughs and words such as “there she goes”, Never was taken before Justice Arnett Without contributing ten dollars and costs To the school fund of Spoon River! “By means of our work we are creating the conditions of a social _order in which no class antagonisms will exist, no revolutions, and thus no revolutionists.” J “The revolutionist knows only ex- ternal obstacles to his activity, no internal ones.” the Farmers HE more one looks into the conditions in which the farmers find them- selves today, the more one becomes convinced that two of the most ardently advocated relief proposals of the capitalists—the cutting of wheat Ijacreage and diversified production—are utterly worth} less. Many farm experts of Wall Street have yelling for a cut in the acreage of seeding wheat. The fact that our wheat exports fell 40% in 1923 has caused some to be misled by this propaganda. It is interesting to note what the application of this remedy means to the farmers. Minne- sota, North Dakota, South Dakota and M acres seeded to wheat, Yet, it is depression. The self-appointed saviors of the farmers who are doing the bidding of their Wall Street masters are also trying to convert the wheat farmers to the idea of livestock raising. The latest figures of the Department of Agriculture estimate the value the Ist as much lower than ok a Fee oe aneneiny, Sons Since January Ist, 1923 the estimated value of farm animals more than a quarter of a billion dollars, horses, swine, and cattle show: 1921 set in on the farms. toning eal malaise today re con ing world ca m > aay Sa two factors make f depression, the f, ong as wo e for on, ‘armers will unable to get out of their as stances, all remedies of capitalists, may be advertised, are not worth 2 . : z : $ F 4