Evening Star Newspaper, February 26, 1898, Page 14

_THE EVENING STAR, SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 1897-24 PAGES. Weitten for The Evening Star. Yoromay have cbhserved,” said the mid- I man of the party, “that (he young women of this country are mighty patriotic, and that they haven't get any great amount “+ for the cireumipcution methods of modern diplomacy. They want fight and a heap of it, and they don’t hesitate to let t men folks in their families know, at break fa: dirner and supper, that they are jv st spoiling for battle ond the deep-mouth- baying of the dogs of war. Just at this of the game they want to get at the Spain so bad that it’s about as an do to keep away from the iting offices and the gangways of the} receiving ships. This is all right and as it It’s the proper sort of spirit for My three daughters get so ometimes in laying down the 1 this big international qu ‘fon that ntry is now wrestling with, and they so eloquently to induce their young singly and individually cast the et in the teeth of Spain, that I can't but overhear them occasionally, and vend to own up that their talk of this kind ts mighty sweet and refreshing muste ears, for I think a whole lot of the | gied banner myself, and have done | bas they should be. rican i op varm , the most patriotic of women would probably begin io and to ponder a good deal on of war should be mad Women, you know, are ing of the picture features of panoply of it, and the fanfaron- trumpets and the muttering of | But when it comes to the point of folks—thelr husbands, fathers and brothers—togging ily-made government straight and marching off to some indef- ith sort o set and drawn is stage of the nung and old, are pretty look each other in‘the eye in a forsaken kind o° Ww: and to © to the sudden conclusion that, some- how or another, the picture doesn’t appear se bright and cheerful as they had t would, and that their sunshir I saw ail this kind of thing, | the boys all over-this land | ng off to our big war. The girls | pretty fi north and south, } s they are now in the common nation- | n@ when hostilities actually broke | ¥ did rot try to hold their men in. | y closed down in the matter of in- ste talk about the rights. and things and they took it out in a | iet weeping in dark corners. m_ of American women 1s empty left coat seem- speak quite as stggestively as his * * * * valry of a United States senator me $50 the other day,” said a lady who recentiy dispesed of her household effects { in Washington preparatory to her removal } 1 “I sent my piano down to the room together with the rest of my gcods. It was rather a fine piano. It was v day when the auctioneer began to stuff, and only two peopie pres- at ared to want a piano—and the | » was the first thing put up. These » ady who manages | e and Senator Till- na. The auctioneer | ano off at a pretty fair figure, prompt tacked $0 to his y sight. ie her bid 1 could see amed to make a higher med to do a bit of sudden and held his peace. There being bids, mo was sold to the © senator knew the auctioneer, and 1 his remark: ‘I'd have gone at ter on that instrument had my t in the ng been.a man.’ So, | n say, I was ‘out’ $0, but I didn’t cted how 1 Tncle Sam's bluejackets in the nent’s line of fighting | ates gove pack a 2 war's man now ng in Wash » “one of our : pany was a humorous duck of a | be’sun’s mate named Murphy *%t born anywhere near was commonpl t that he certainly only e on the y we coaied | ne short had been noa and he had more than a lit- ties. The sea be- afternoon we pulled Murphy, with a lot ordered over t off th Murphy's ard chair Villefrars 1 good de ed the Chianti wine on these if pv in time Murphy’ up forward on the pt him practic men forward aning po- outboard out of dn't show nto Wan ng with him. Mar rd sic ir hangin * bucket lashed to rphy. Murphy had Tk and the the skipper k and resumed his cours: for Villetr Up for'ard, after t ft: War's men, we all chew- « out what a first-rate all- 3 i nin the flesh 1 hands one of the up to the for'ard aning. He had n't of the yell that 1» seoot- in th -look- e'd got his breath told ghost, asked him said th a. 2 chief bo’sun’s mate hopped up to the for’ard fighting top, and there he feund our mourn>d Murphy stretched out scund asleep and snoring like as if he was ¥ ing it for wages. On the afternoon be- fc Murphy had announced to himself hat, side-cleaning or no side-cleaning, he ‘Was going to have some sle>p, and he had sneaked up to the fighting top, the last place on @ man-o’-war where a missing man would be looked for, to get it. It was only by aceident and good Juck that he man- aged to get up tuer2 without any of the ship's company noticing him as he made the climb. The small amount of money that was lopped off Murphy's pay by the court-martial that tried him didn’t make up | were the cause of the smell. | verdict. by a good deal for the value of the coal burnt in tke ship's furnaces during th> ccuple of hours that the ship hunted for him in the blue waters of the Mediter- rarean.” = kk ek t “The president of the ‘Don’t Worry’ Club out in my town committed suicide th2 otker day,” said a hotel guest from Iowa. “The local papers gave ‘business difficul- ties" as the reason for his self-destruction.” MB eae Oe “T. Buchanan Read, the poet who wrote th> famous ‘Sheridan's Ride,’ was a well- krown figure around Washington during the war,” said an old Washingtonian. “He was a brilliant man, a notable bon vivant and high-flyer when he could afford to be, and perhaps a bit careless, too, in his hab- its. One afternoon, in the summer of 1864, Read drifted into one of th: committee Tocms of the Senate—he was on friendly terms with most of the big men up at the Capitol—and, slumping into a chair, fell fast asleep. While he slept a coupl> of serators came into the room to do some let- ter writing. The two senators shortly be- came involved in a low-toned but warm dis- cussion as to the progress of the war. Final- L one of them, who belonged to the ‘peace-at-any-price’ party, permitted his teres to grow loud. and he slammed his fist down on a table and fairly shouted: “We must hav» peace!’ “The sleeping poet jumped from his chair like a man electrified. The two sena- tors looked at him, rather astonished at the suddenness of his awak=ning. Read ‘ub- bed his eyes for a moment and looked around him. Then he murmured these werds: “Peace! Oh, that some white-winged bird from tke south Would build it's nest in the cannon’s mouth And stop it’s roar.” “I don’t remember ever having hoard of a mere charming bit of impromptu poetical ecmposition than that a x “The smell of a drug store,” said a re- cently returned traveler to a Star report- er, “is a very distinctive thing, and the peculiarity of it is the same in all parts of the world. My first impression in this matter was noticing that three or, four erug stores. in Baltimore, where I spent my youthful da: all had the same smell. When I grew up I came to Washington, and I found that the drug stores here had the same smell. From this city I moved to New York, and from there to New Orleans. Though all other smells varied in the dif- ferent cities, that of the drug stores was always the same. Circumstances then sent me to many European cities, and, though the arrangement of drug stores, or apoih- ecaries, as they are called abroad, are somewhat different from what they are in this country, they all smell alike. The smell is a result of a combination of smells and not like the smell of any one particu- lar thing. No particular drug ever seems | to have the advantage over any other, and no druggist that I have ever talked to on the subject has ever given me the same idea as to his opinion of the leading smell, but they are always identical. The little apothecaries in the sands of Egypt smell like the fashionable pharmacies of New York, Londen, Paris or St. Petersburg. Scme years ago the minstrel performers used to teil a gag as to the smell of drug stores. It generally wound up that sponges Now, the fact is, sponges have their own and a very distinctive smell, and they are gen- erally exposed in drug stores, but I have found that the smell of the drug store is the same whether sponges are there or not.” “T had a singular experience several years ego in a court trial in New York,” remark- ed a treasury official to a Star reporter, “and it goes to show how people get things mix2d. The particular case was that of Suit brought by the government to secure from the bondsmen of an army officer the amount thet he was short in his financial accounts. The case was on trial for sev- eral days and I was sent there with the records from th» auditor's office, the youch- ers of the officer and other official papers on which the suit was based. The Army Regulations in regard to the duties of dis- bursing officers played a prominent part in the proceedings, as may bz imagined, and the particular regulations ag to the duties of the officer concerned were read several times during each day of the trial. Though I ¢ and am rathsr familiar with the va- rious paragraphs relating to disbursing of- ficers, I did not pay much attention to the Paragraphs that were read, supposing, of course, that they were all right. Jusi as the government was closing its cas cistrict attorney read a paragraph, saying that on it he would ask a verdict for the government. It struck me that there was something wrong In the paragraph, that {t contained more words and went intu more detail than the paragraph that I was ac- customed to bear read or had read myself often. “Judge Brown, who was presiding over the court, had announced a brief recess, at the conclusion of which the arguments of the district attorney and counsel for the defense were to be heard. As the court room cleared out I stepped over to the district attorney's table and took @ look at the Army Regulations that he had so frequestiy read, and upon which he had depended so much for his One look satisfied me as to why their reading jarred me. They were army sulations all right, but they were the army regulations for use of the army of tha confederate states of America! It appeared that the district attorney had sent one of his law clerks to the office library for a copy of the Army Regulations, and the clerk brought the first book he saw bearing that title, taking it for granted, of course, that the volume was the one wanted. Strange as it may seem, both district at- torney and the counsel for the defense had quoted from the book during the entire trial, and neither of them had even looked 4s to the authority for the publication of the same. I quietly picked up the book and went back to the district attorney's office with it. Upon a search I found the Army Regulations of 1885, signed by the then Secretary of Wa Tpon comparison of the paragraphs in relation to disbursing officers | found that the language was practically the same, the confederate army regulati ing been copied from the regulations in use in the army for many years prior to the war. In his argument the district attorney used the regulations of the United States army, and upon ‘hem secured the verdict he desired. It would have been rather rough had he secured a verdict on the regulations of the confeder- ate army, though I believe the error would been discovered had I not more anything else glanced volume h had been used. and 3 1 say, covered the same ground practically and used different words in do- er not have from curiosity tha at the w —___ GLASS SKATES, They Are the Latest Feature in Ice Rinks This Winter. The newest feature of interest in the New York ice rinks is the use of glass skates. It is found that Skates with glass runners are far better, both for speed and ease in gliding for pleasure, than are the skates with metal runners, and several pairs are now being used in one of the metropolitan rinks. The inventor has suc- ceeded in reducing the glass to a hardness that insures an edge which practically nevgr becomes blunt. The tempering pro- cess remains a secret, but it is a fact that severe contact with hard ice does not frac- ture the glass. To look at these skates one would not suppose they were made of any- thing els® than metal. for the runners are always colored, in order to disguise the substance of which they are made. The coloring process is arbitrary, and tints in tne case of ladies’ skates-are always made to correspond with the colors of the wear- ers costume. The runners of these glass skates are attached directly to an espe- cially made shoe which laces from the heel up the back. The combination not only gives a skate which is perfectly easy in motion, but the high shoe stiffens the an- kle to an extent which greatly aids in the enjoyment and adds to the safety of the exercise. GROWING A BEARD “Yes,” sighed the young man who, hav- ing a couple of weeks ago dacided to raise a beard has since been enduring with more or less fortitude the odium and contumely heaped upon him by his friends, to say nothing of the ostracism that he has bean compeHed to submit to at the-hands of his wife and family, “I am fully aware that in undertaking this grave step fz a man’s career I have for the time being put my- self outside the pale of civilized society, de- prived myself of the right to 2xpect human sympathy and sadly violated the artistic sensibilities of those who have my best in- terests at heart. Do not, I beg of you, re- gard me as a man of an entirely callous na- ture. Balieve me, I feel my position keen- ly. It afflicts me more than I have words to express, for I value the good will and kindly feeling of my friends most highly, and I have always endeavored to deserve at least th>-esteem, if not the affection, of my family. I shall ask you to believe that I would do anything to hold intact the good-natured, tolerant and helpful disposi- tion with which I have been regarded—or was regarded, I should say—in this com- munity. I insert the past tense, for I fsar that since I began to act on my determina- tion to permit the hair on my face to grow, I have gone far toward sacrificing the gen- erous, well-wishing spirit with which I have bean looked upon for many years, a8 man and boy, in this town. “Perhaps 1 might, witn the mustering of all the latent self-repression with which I may have been endowed, force myself to complaisantly and at least with exterior patience endure the askance looks and the averted gaze of my friends, the mourntul,. unhappy-eyed regard of my. wife while I am around the house and the frankly-ex- hibited suspicion, not to say fear, with which my young children greet my every appearance at home. Loathsome and des- picable as I have been made to feel that i look in the eyes of everybody who for the past two weeks has been compelled to bear the temporary or protracted sight of me, either in the course of business or social life, yet I cannot bring» myself to feel that I have quite deserved the grisly manifesiations of an alleged sense of hu- mor that my friends and acquaintances have afflicted me with. I cannot, in- deed. I shall ask you to give me your un- biased judgment as to whether you per- ceive anything prodigiously funny, any- thing gargantuanly humorous, enything side-splittingly comical, anything shriek- ingly laughable, anything uproariously or hilariously cachinnatory in observations such as these, for instance: “ ‘Hey, there, when’re you going to get mugged for the rogue’s gailery?’ “Say, if you don’t look like a man that'd walk nine miles through snow knee-deep to bite his mother, I’ll go to —! ‘Ah, there, my spinach!” i “Get next to th’ loose chewin’!’ = pues Old Hoss Hoey!’ “*When are you going to push it in or break it off? bh “Pipe off his Pefferlets!’ Sore like Holmes, the murderer, don't e? “Dead ringer, you are, for a second- story worker and all-around crook I saw captured once.’ “Say, here’s a dime; go get a shave and give us a show tor our white altey.’ “ ‘How. often have you been run in so far?” “‘Good make-up for an handler, all right, all right!’ “ ‘So you are going to the Klondike this spring, hey?” “ ‘Say, talk about prismatic hair! Jinged if some of it ain’t green!’ hat Dick Croker ““When G’je start wake-up?” “Belay, there, shipmate! Why ain't you in uniform?’ ‘Hey, d’ye need any help?’ ‘Well, yes, it’s geod in spots—blooming spotty, though!” 'Good boy, J. Ham. Lewis!’ Must have made a vow, eh?’ ‘Ain't you afraid of losing your job? “ “Muzzle him!’ “Say, does it hurt much, and do you take gas for it?’ “Excruciatingly funny as all this isn’t, yet it is almost as the lulling music of aeolian harps compared with this mourn- ful, plaintive, reproachful, ever-retteraied query from the little woman I vowed to love and honor: “ “William, are you really trying to break my heart?” P-street pan- ———.__ THE CONDUCTOR IS RIGHT. Women on the Street Cars Should Show More Consideration. “Men are beginning tc frequently discuss the question of giving up their seats in Street cars to ladies,” said a conductor on ore of the electric lines. “I overhzar them talking every day. There are still numer- ous champions of that old courtesy--under all circumstances give your seat to a lady —but they are dwindling 2ach day. Two years ago twice as many men in Washing- ten gave their seats to ladies as today. 1 suppose there are many reasons for this, but I hear men grumbling about the lack ot appreciation of most women. They give this as the cause for falling to longer put into execution a custom they have fol- lowed for years. I heard a man say the other day: ‘I was taught to give my seat to a lady, and, believing it was right, fol- lowed tha teaching until a few nonths ago. Now, I do it only in oases I think deserving. Too many women have failed to Say a word when I arose and gave them my place. This in the face of the fact that I was tirea out from a hard day’s work.’ “I think, too,’ continued the conductor, “that msn have other complaints. I hear them say that it fs pretty hard to have to stand while ladies take up two or three seats with boys and misses who would be renning and playing if they were at hom and who really care nothing about bein seated. These ladies pever offer to have one of their children stand to give a seat to a tired man. They not only keep the seats occupied, but take up as much epace 4s possible. If the women would frequ:ntly try to be obliging ‘o men on street cars in this and other ways, 1 think -here would be a revival of the manly spirit wnich has for years cheracterized the mal> passengers on street cars. But as it is going now, a few years more will find it completely wiped out instead of revised.” And ike conducter talked on: “Many wo- men, hz continued, “are more indifferent to acts of kindness to thelr own sex than to the men. They get on my car and eight or ten of them will monopolize the whole side of a car, leaving enough xpace b3- tween, if they sat closer together, to fur- nish seats for three or four people. If oth- er women come in it is fr2quently the case that those seated never budge to make rcom. It would be little trouble for them to close up and give a seat to a new pas- songer. They do men this way also, and that is one of the complaints of male pas- sengers. A man hates to go into a car and stare around like a fool in the hope that some one will take the cue and make rcom for him. He pref2rs to stand, al- though he may be tired from a hard day's werk. He remembers his treatment in the course of time, however, and becomes on3 of the men who no longer show attention to the women in the matter of rising and giving them a seat. “Let the women show consideration,” concluded the conductor, “and I believe the change that will come about will be grati- fying and satisfactory to them.” ———_—_ THE CHAIN GANG. I¢ is an Ancient and Familiar Local Institution, “Those gentlemen who attired in the peculiar uniform that fancy ascribes to the pirate and freebooter,” says an old-time Washingtonian, “now known as the ‘chain gang,’ do not belong to a modern institu- tion, as it is generally supposed. While it may be a new custom in some parts of the country to work the offenders of municipal law on the streets, the custom has pre- vailed in this city for about three-fourths ofa century. The corporation of Washing- ton established the asylum in 1821, and the male inmates of the penitentiary depart- ment were ordered to report for work on the streets November 28, 1823. The asy- lum, or poor and work house, was located then on the square bounded by M, N, 6ih and 7th streets northwest, and in’ the early days those placed in the gang were so smail in number as to attract no at- tention. I do not think that any attempt to place the offenders in the black and white stripes was made till long after the asylum was moved to the banks of the Anacostia about 1846.” pas Curious, From Brooklyn Life. = He—“Is she really so curious?” She—“Curious? Why, she’d listen to ad- vice just to find out what it was.” A HAPPY INCIDENT “I told her, like Tn bet ¢ @ good many of you fellows did. ler similar circume stances,” said the fortable-looking man, “that I'd never gincke another cigar with- out her consent ffom the day we were mar= ried. Had to tell her that, or she'd never have consented to me, for she comes, you see, from one of families that has had ea minister in it for about nine hundred years, 16 pet aversion of the whole outfit f tions has been to- bacco in all ite t is—so that she came legitimately by er ess on the nicotine ee, why she made this question, and Medes-and-P: w that, so far as she ft was to be a case or smoke and no -promised that from the day we wei dyried I'd never smoke another cigar. I put the accent on cigar, but she didn’t notice ft. Commencing to see through it now, aren't you? You see, she never knew before we were married that I smoked anything but cigars, and so, when I made this solemn promise about knocking off cigars‘after our marriage, she though® she had* the whole sitnation clinched. Well, maybe I meant when I made her that promise that I wouldn't smoke at all any more after we-were mar- Tied—and then, again, maybe I didn’t; for I don’t believe I-was any more in the habit then of burning bridges behind me than I am now. “Anyhow, this no-cigar promise bothered me a heap from the very day that we were made one and the f4w went into effect. I wanted a smoke’ mighty bad on the train when we started off on the honeymoon, but I staved off the desire, although I can’t but confess that I found a lot of sneaking satisfaction ¢ven then: in the reflection that it was cigars only. that I had passed my promise about. During the three weeks that we were away on the trip I'll gamble that I yearned harder for a smoke about a yard long than any Tantalus ever hankered for a mouthful of -water—but I didn't want to break in on the’ otherwise happy situa- tion, and looked the other way when a man hove in-sight smoking a fine, big, fat cigar —but the sort 0” open-at-both-ends promise that I had made on the smoking question began to float around in my head and please me a whole lot, all the same. “When we got back and went to house- keeping our little shack looked so cheer- ful and cozy when I reached: home in the evening that it just made me ache all over for tobacco smoke and slathers of It. It didn’t somehow seem like the real thing to hop into slippers and a house Jacket without having some sort of smoke ac- companiment. But I held in for: more'n a week, although I’m bound to admit that the line of tainks I had coming during that period wouid have reached a good ways. “I got desperate the second week, and says I to myself, ‘This has got to quit; if I don’t have a smoke within twenty-four hours I'm a goner, sure enough. It may be hard on the girl at first, but I'm Ret- ting too good for any use, anyhow, and I've been smoking too long to knock off this way. It’s too much punishment. And if I smoke I won't be breaking any prom- ise, at that.’ “So the next day I gave up $12 for a meerschaum pipe with a bowl that held something close onto a quart, got a couple of pounds of good tobacco, put on the nicest apple-pie expression ‘that I knew how and pranced up home.. “You ought to have seen the little wo- man’s countenance when I flashed those smoking goods on her after dinner! ““‘But your promise to me—’ she started to say. ; “ Does this Stack 0” stuff look anything like cigars, my'déar? was the rehearsed remark that I interrupted her with. “Well. say, of course I had the theo- retical, legal, technical right in the situa- tion, but I felt a good deal like a grave robber, all the same. But I intended to see it through, and’ so I loaded up that pipe and had a smoke that I can feel out at the ends of my fingers yet, it was so kind of ‘fillin’,’ as it were. ‘This was the opening break, and, though the wounded-fawn look in the little woman’s-eyes kind of haunted me at first, I kept right on trying to get that pipe as black as the ace of spades, and smoking a pound of tobacco in about three days in the attempt. Her grief seemed to wear off some in about a week, but the pipe began to wear on my nerves, and I commenced to: long for good cigar smoke, though I. didn’t intend to go back on my promise. I don’t remember ever having been so pleased all over as I’ was when I started’ to-light up the pipe one evening, and the Uttle woman flashed a box eS and good cigars, too, on me, and Si Bo, as I Jack, if you're bound to smoke, you might as well smoke cigars instead of that horrid old pipe, that makes the curtains und everything smell I don’t know how!’ “And I've been smoking my old brand of cigars ever since. What's more, I went away on a business trip about three months after I was married, and what do you sup- pose she said to me when I got back? Why, she sald: “* ‘Jack, you don’t know how I’ve missed your old cigar smoke around the room evenings! ” ———— SHOE HIEROGLYPHICS, Occult Symbols Devised to Deeeive Womankind, “People often ask me the meaning of the aprarently crazy hjeroglyphs and figures that are stamped on the inner side of the uppers of ready-made shoes nowadays,” sald an F street shoe dealer to a Star man. “As every shoe manufactory has a secret stamp code of its own, and there is, there- fore, no possibility of the general public learning more than that such codes exist, I may as well tell you that the vanity of modern mortals, and especially women, 1s at the bottom of these peculiar stamped characters and figures. You'd be surprised .to know, for instance, how many women there are who imagine that they wear a No. 3 shoe, when {n reality their size is a couple of figures larger. A shoe salesman who urderstands his business can tell. pre- cisely the number of the shoe a woman customer wears at a glance. But as often as not a woman whose foot is a No. 5 calls for a shoe a couple of sizes smaller, and the mysterious stamped-hieroglyph scheme was devised for the purpose of encourag- frg her in the belief that her foot is a couple of sizes smaller than it really meas- ures in shoe leather, ‘When a woman-calls for a number 3 to fit a number 5 foot, no shoe salesman of this era who cares anything for his job is going to say, ‘Madam, your foot re- quires a number 5.’ He simply breaks out a shoe of the style she requests that he feels confident wiil fit her comfortably, and lets it go at that. “A woman rarely éhinks to inquire if the shoe is really of the size she asked for, for she takes it for granted that the. sales- man has given her what she demanded. But when a woman does ask, for instance, ‘This is a number 8,,is it?’ it’s the sales- man’s business to unblushingly reply, “‘Yes’m, it’s a number 3." -The woman cus- tomer. might examine..the- hieroglyphs in- side the uppers for.@;week without finding out any different, @n@ even if she had the key to the puzabp Jtqwould only make her feel bad, so wha. woull.be the use?” it A SMALL MATTER. © La But the Presifién@s’ Thoughtfulness Made a ifpy Very Happy. An eleven-yearld lad, while studying his history lesson last wéek, learned thet Sat- urday would be t McKinley’s birth- day, and though it, would be a nice thing to send the chtef::magistrate a birthday card. The one We see@red and mailed con- tained the followfng advice: “In what- ever station you,gre, has called you to fill the place, and,you should do your duty.” Saturday’s meiifbrought the boy a White House letter, adtiressed to Mr. it was from Sec “Porter, who said he had been directed by the President to ac- knowledge the recelpt of the birthday token and to convey the President's thanks for the remembrance. ‘The youth was delighted with the attention,.but was disappointed that the President should think he was a man and was anxious to rectify the mis- take. The President was to leave for Philadel- phia at 10 o'clock Monday morning,. but notwithstanding the pressure of official and to the President’s room when he presented himself about a ener day. As long as ives never forget that feopee gies President thanked w STAGE “BUSINESS.” “What I'd like to see,” said the man of forty, with the strong cigar, “is a good play. I think if some fellow’d write a good play and put it én the stage it ‘ud make money in this country. I haven't seen what Td call a good play in a whole lot more years than I want to figure on, now that my hair's beginning to thin out on top. -Yet I've been going to the theater right along every week or so, hoping that a play would finally come along that would giv me the kind of thrill that I used to expe- rience when, as a young fellow, I used to get In the gallery line on Saturday nights with my quarter in my fist and a bunch of peanuts In my pocket, and enough stored-up enthusiasm to make me hoarse all day Sunday. Now, I’m not knocking the cocktail comedies and the leg and lin- gerie hop dreams that the people who go to the theaters nowadays get so much of. They're all right for folks that like that Kind of thing, although my opinion is that when you've seen one of 'em you've seen all of em. I'm only trying to welt the kind of plays they've been dishing out to me for my $1.50 during the past few years. I'm a plain man, and I was raised on plain plays that people of my ordinary mental caliber can get hold and make something of and get worked up over. I haven't been good and worked up at a drama for ten years. ‘The young fellows that do the pretty business .in the dramas they've been tak- ing my tickets for of late years do a heap of talking and posing and leaning on pianos end grabbing women and hypnotizing and all that sort of business, but they've struck me as being the worst set of do-nothing, effeminate rag-chewers imaginable. Just when you think they're geing to grab: the villains and make mincemeat of ’em and throw ‘em off the top of a cliff a thousand feet or so high and poke ‘em under the fifth rib with their pig-stickers after the regular two-up and cne-down strokes, the cowardly yaps just saunter down the cen- ter of the stage and remark that they’! see em next week at Fentainbleau, or that they'll let "em live ‘to regret that blow,’ or that they'll pull their freight just to save the loidy’s honor, or throw out some other cheap kind of a con just to cover up their own cowardice. In the plays that of late years they've been chucking at me and other mea of my ilk that preserve the same stage traditions that I do, when the time arrives for the swell girl of the show to let out on the sneaky scheesicks that's been foreclosing the mortgage on her father’s farm and driving her beau to drink—when it’s up to her to crowd right up to the footlights and tell the black- guard that he’s no good and a loafer and @ thief and a cheap guy in general, why, What does she do, instead of holding up and swinging the documents that'll land him in state’s prison for thirty years or so, but just walk to the property bell rope at the back drop and ring for the footman and tell him that, as she’s got an appoint- ment at the embassy at , he might as well get the brougham around to the door. So I'm just compelled to sit in my seat and wait for something to break loose—wait -or the lorg unheard-of brother to rush in in his sailor sult and kick the chap with the black curly mustache out of the window, for instance—and I never get my money's worth of things happening. “They don’t do anything in the plays now- adays. They take it out in chin*music and guff, but they all seem to be afraid of tousling up their hair. Instead of doing all the big and mighty things that they say they’re going to do in full view of the au- dience, they come a-loping in in the next act and tell everybody what they've done. If these big-talking chaps, who cavort around on the stage nowadays, would do half the courageous dead game things right in front of people, the shows would be worth going to see. Why the dickens don’t some good stage people get together and give us The Romany Rye’ and ‘The Lights o’ London’ and ‘In the Ranks’ and good, strong, have-at-thee stuff like that, instead of trying to make people like me that hove been through the mill take stock in all this ‘sex against sex’ and ‘uncon- genial wife’ and ‘unrealized ideal’ flubdub?” —— MALVINA FIXED IT. She Wanted Her Alcohol Fall Strength. “Speakin’ of b’ilin’ things,” remarked Deacon Puffer to the throng in the village store, “reminds me of my wife. Some time ago she sez tu me, sez she, ‘Josiah, ef th’ exertion wen’t be tu much fur ye, I'd be obleeged ef yer would fetch me "bout a pint of alcohol. An, Josiah,’ sez she, ‘I want it strong.’ “What she wanted it fur ‘pears I’ve fur- gcttin’ neow, but when I fetched it tu hum ske smelled of it several times an’ sez she: ‘It du beat the world, Josiah, how these pesky critters du ‘dulterate things neow adays. Why,’ sez she, ‘if this hain’t more’n half water then my Christian name hain’t Malvina.’ Well, gentlemen,” said the dea- con, uncrossing his legs and then crossing them again, “Malvina bein’ Mrs. Puffer’s Christian name, as ye all be knowin’, it warn’t fur me tu dispute, an’ I vow’d thet th’ best thing fur tu be dore was fur me tu take th’ stuff back an’ suggest thet what was wanted was pure stuff, or none ’tall. ‘An’ then hev ’em send worse stuff than afore,’ remarked Malvina. ‘No, Josiah,’ sez she, ‘them critters be past redeemin’. Leave it tu me, Josiah.’ “I left it tu Malvina, gentlemen,” explain- ed the deacon, after helping himself to a bit of cheese and a cracker, “‘an’ out I goes tu du my chores, I ’spose I was at ’em fur "bout five or six minutes when all of a sud- den I heerd th’ durnest explosion an’ th’ talicst yellin’ from th’ kitchen, where I left Malvina, thet ye ever heerd tell of. I runs in there, an’ what ye ‘spose I fina? “Durn my button: chuckled the deacon, before any one could reply, “ef I didn’t dis- cover Malvina flat of her back by th’ stove, which was busted ull tu thunder, with her eyebrows all gone, an’ no more hair on her head hardly than ye'd find on a baby’s. ‘Bury me from th’ meetin’ house, Josiah,’ sez she, as I bent over her, ‘an’ don’t ‘low Hannah Perkins in th’ door, fur I'm done fur.’ But ehe warn’t done fur, an’ when i'd convinced her of thet fact, an’ thet she hed not been called as yet, she up an’ told me all "bout it. “It "pears, gentlemen,” continued the dea- con, “thet Malvina hed decided tu strength- eu thet alcohol, an’ she concluded thet tu du thet she'd better bile it deo She put it in a D’iler, slapped it on th’ stove, an’ then goes "bout her work. Th’ stove was putty hot, an’ afore Malvina hed done more’n tu or three things, an’ hed jes start- ed tu look tu see how thet b'ilin’ process was a-comin’ on, th ‘durn thing blew up. Malvina never sed much ’bout it, more’n tu tell me how it happened, an’ if she’s hed alcohol in th’ house sence I hain’t heerd of it.” Resta A FAMOUS OLD PUMP. A Depression in the Pavement Marks Its Site. “Taough the modern mode of supplying water for the use of the population has driven the familiar town pump from view,” remarked a 7th street merchant a few days ago, “the sites of many are difficult to eradicate. When I came here, over fifty Years ago, one of the first objects I became attached to was the old wooden pump in front of where Wm. Ballantyne & Sons are now located, and, though the stock was taken out and the well was filled up years ago, the site is still plain by the depression in the roadway. I am not sure, but I think the carriageway was then of ‘mother earth’ but possibly this was an impertant thor- oughfare of business and travel; it may have had a coat of gravel. I have seen this street in cobble stones, gneiss, wood and asphalt. The well, to my knowledge, has been filled up three times, and on each oc- casion, it was supposed, completely, but, though the depression is slight, those who slaked their thirst at ‘Harbaugh’s pump’ in their boyhood can easily find the site. 1 must say that I am glad it so appears, for sometimes it Is a comfort to call up the scenes of the past, and it is not infrequent when I am passing that the picture of the old pump and the neighbors with bucket end pitcher rises before me. This was one of the best of the public pumps within the city, and on more than one occasion was its capacity put to a severe test. I have heard that at the burning of the Post Office De- partment in the ‘30's and a fire in the same decade-at the hh office the old ee It Was Possible. Ma Staal eps eopie 9 So Do ee ae ‘become president road? — ‘Smith— ree, if he docen't reform.” nae = ms rae? = AIRES Dari tS Te PARR Written for The Exvcning Star. A Jingle of Gentleness. There are times for the luster of genuine gold, And times for the glitter of paste; The semblance of good things we n> withhold Lest good things themselves go to waste. i not So, wherefore be rugged, when court-sy calls For accents polite as her due; Retribution’s deep tone no less potently falls From a voice that can manage to coo. For it's well understood, Imitations, when good, Are things that none need be above; It Is no sin to stoop To mock-turtie soup; Then, why not a mock turtlo-dove? Then let us not scoff at the smile which is bland, Though rage’s hot torrents have poured; Nor th2 emblem of peace that is borne in the hand That longs for the clutch of a sword. Here’s a bumper to Spain, and a trivial refrain— A host should find cheer for a guest— And a welcome again in a jovial strain, With manners as fine as the best! For it’s well understood, Imitations, when good, Are things that non» need be above, 21t 1s no sin to stoop To mock-turtle soup; Then, why not a mock turtle-dove? * x x Couldn't Understand It. “I think,” said the arctic explorer, “that I will make another start within the next six months.” “You'd better go before then,” replied his manager. “You see, it's well to strike while the iron’s hot. You don’t want to take too many chances on a loss of inter- est, you know.” “Iam no* afraid of that. My enthusiasm will never decline. However, if you think it better, we will start within three months, two mont’is or one month—whichever you prefer.” “Good: Now, have you any preference as to where you go “Certainly I hav rejoinder. pole.” The manager shoved his chair back and gazed at the explorer in silent wonder. Then he slowly repeated, “To the north pole!” “Certainly, to the north pole.”” “But, my dear man, what on earth do you wish to go to the north pole for? There was the astonished “I want to go to the north aren't any people there who would buy tickets to a lecture.” * Trust. “Yep,” said Farmer Corntossel to the relative whom he was visiting, ‘“Josiar's away studyin’ some more.” “You are devotirg a great deal of atten- tion to his schooling.” “Yes,” was the answer. “But Josiar kin stand it. Josiar is a reg'lar intellectual athlete. Now, when I want to think I’ve got to git out my spees an’ sit down with the paper after the day's over, an’ kind o’ git a runnin’ start. But Josiar, he kin stop right in the middle of anythin’ he happens to be doin’ an’ think, if he fe>is Ike it. I used to have to keep an extra hired man ‘cause Josiar ‘ud every once In @ while git took with a notion to siddown under an apple tree an’ think. An’ tt didn’t 1 no difference how warm the weat o 1 concluded that it "d be a pity ef he was to run out o’ thinkin’ ma- terial an’ I'm sendin’ "im to school som: mor>, Only this time it’s goin’ to be some- different, somethin’ that'll give “im pation along with his thinkin’ an’ hetp na livin’ ef he should ever feel s: inclined. He's learnin’ all about drugs.” “How ts he getting along replied the father, as hy "tno expert in hand- but that ther t makes me proud of Josiar. When I a boy write that word right off, without takin’ his pen off'n the paper oncet, as is plain to be ee } was done here, I off my hat an’ tell that nothin’ ain't too good fur *im.” * wh se x * Winter Quarters, Somewhah, aw yuthuh, I kain’ be ‘zackly clear, De butterfly 13 wat Foh de sunny time o” ye an An’ it made de cricket tremble Like he felt a drefful pain, Dat news de groun’-hog tol’ ‘em When he come back home again, De katy-did’s a whinin’ "Bout de cold, f'um morn till late, An’ de fishin’-worm’s a-wishin’ It wah time foh diggin’ bait. But dey gotter wait an’ shiver Till de passin’ of de storm, An’ cuddle ‘roun’ de lightnin’ bug, A tryin’ to keep warm. * x % His Only Complaint. Mr. Meekton was vainly endeavoring to get a composition which looked like a mixture of tar and molasses off his hands, when he turned to interrupt his wife's re- marks. “Henrietta,” he said, “you hi to another meeting, haven't “Certainly,” she answ gloves on the center table. I suppose you made a speech?” aturally.” You said that man is an oppressive ty- rant, didn't you?” ve just been ou?” , throwing her “You observed that it was time to break the shackles with which the husband sought to trammel the freedom of a wife and to show him that his mastery w; after all, but a relic or barbarism whic enlightened humanity has outgrown.” “You overheard me rehearsing my speech,” claimed. ever mind. And then you referred to the way in which a husband ought to pose as a domineering dictator and an irrespon- sible autocrat?” “Yes, I did. And I may once for all, if you have a offer to those remarks.” “None, whatever, Henrietta,” replied Mr. Meekton, as he took some earth out of a flower pot and tried to rub some of the coating off his hands. “Only I must say it seems a little hard that after enjoying the luxury of thus relieving your mind you should come back and criticise the way in which I cleaned your bicycle while you were gone.” nh 8 well inquire, objection to ABOUT MAPLE SUGAR, This is the Time © the Camps to Start Up. “The American people are evidently very partial to maple sugar, for there are some- thing like 40,000,000 pounds of this sweet commodity sold in this country annually,” said a leading commission dealer in York to the writer yesterday. Twenty-five years ago one-third of this quantity would supply the demand, and the bulk of the product then came from Vermont. Today about 8,000,000 pounds come from the Green mountain state and the rest is made in New York, Pennsylvania and Ohio. In Delaware and Cattaraugus counties, New York, and in Somerset county, Pa., thousands of acres of land are now devoted to the cul- tivation of maple trees, and the sugar pro- duced is just.as good as the best Vermont article. The industry is a very thriving and profitable one. Aside from the value of the wood for cabinet making, it is estimated that when the sap from ten acres of maple trees is converted into syrup and sugar it gives a net return of from $15 to $20 per acre. “The real maple sugar season begins about March 1, and lasts until the middleof April, yet one sees every year early in Feb- ruary, in the high-priced fancy groceries of this and other cities, tempting-looking bars and cakes of maple sugar labeled ‘Vermont —First Run.’ The retail dealers buy that ar- ticle for just what they represent it to be to their customers, but instead of being the first run of the Vermont sugar camps, it is the last run of the year before and some- thing else. At the close of every maple Sugar season certain Vermont dealers and dealers in other sugar-making localities, too, buy up from the farmers all the poor or refuse syrup and sugar that they then have on hand. These dealers send out agents through the country to hunt up the inferior left-over stock. It is bought cheap and is kept ov until next winter. As early as January the dealers begin tao pre- pare it for the market. “The syrup and sugar are boiled to- gether with large additions of cheap brown sugar and glucose. The result of this re- vamping of the last year’s inferior goods into goods still more inferior ts shipped to New York and other cities as the first of the new crop of Vermont or other maple sugar before a tree has been tapped for the Season's run of sap. And although it lacks the flavor of the genuine maple sugar, the city folks buy it at fancy prices and gloat over it. “It is the popular belief that pure maple sugar is invariably known by its dark, damp-looking appearance. In the old days of maple-sugar making the product was necessarily very dark, because the simple processes then in use for its manufacture could not make it light. It was also full of impurities. Nowadays it is not the dark maple sugar that should be regarded as the pure article. Indeed, it is more apt to be the most impure. The very best maple sugar that comes from Vermont and else- where is of a light, clear, dry, glossy brown—so very light, in fact, that it looks like clarified beeswax.” violas dimen wants more.” Partially Deacon—“Ah! my friend, you must strive ‘weaknesses against this fecling of dissatisfaction) of human nature that, no matter how much a man gets, Reformed Character—“Well, I dunno’ "bout that; not in @ p'lice court *e @on't.”—Sketch. :