Evening Star Newspaper, June 18, 1922, Page 63

COULD A MAN LIVE FOR A WEEK IN THE CAPITOL BUILDING AND THEN TELL STORY? BY LARRY O'TOOLE. OME time ago a discussion arose on Capitol Hill as to whether it would be possible for a man to live in the Capitol and office buildings, transact all his business, get sufficient exercise and be amused. without leaving thers for a week. There is no disposition in this story to give the impression that the facts set forth are all accurate. They were | related by a person who deciares that the experiences were his own, and 2 careful checking up of the time and places mentioned would indicate tha} the story can be a true one. The date when these happenings occurred and the name of the person who declares that he lived in the nation's Capitol for a week are with- held purposely, in order not to em- barrass in case any rule or regula- tion was broken. Likewise, this nar- rative must not be seized upon by any bachelor candidate for Congress who thinks he can come to Wash- ington and live without paying rent. “When 1 relate my experiences to you,” says the person who figures in the tale. “I am doing so with the distinct understanding that my name will not be used, nor will the location of the room or rooms or location where 1 slept be disclosed. I make this stipulation because it might be embarrassing to some of my friends who helped me win the wager, for the feat was undertaken as a result of & bet, the stakes of which were sent anonymously to well charities. “1 o'clock and called upon friends in that building to see * %k ENTERED the House office build- Ing on Monday morning at 9 several of my about making arrangements for sleeping quarters. There are some very comfortable couches in the jiouse office building and in the Cupitol itself, as well as in the Sen- «te office building. I then passed, by way of the underground passage, to the Capitol, and, going over to the Senate end. took the unique trolley 10 the large marble structure where the senators have their offices. If you can deduce just where my sleep- ing quarters were. §0 ahead. “This took up my time until the liouse convened, and at 12:10 I took a seat in the gallery, where I listened to a debate until 1:30, when I went downstairs to the House restaurant and had luncheon with friends. I then went to a certain committee room, wrote several business letters and mailed them in one of the post offices that are provided for the use of the lawmakers. Returning to the zallery. I listened to the debate until 5 o'clock and then went to the restau- rant and ate my dinner. “Having purchased enough news- papers to pass away the evening, I retired to the place where T had de- cided to spend Monday night. The night's rest did me worlds of good and 1 got up and went into a certain office where T shaved and made ready for the next day’s adventure. “In case somé oné may gather the known ; jdea that 1 went with a suit case full of clothing, I want to say that I had a little pocket safety razor and two of the patent collars that need GOO& Bed. Modern Conveniences Make Such a Feat Possible—Luxury of a Modern Hotel, With Many Little Accommoda~ tions Not Found in the Average Hos- telry—The Writer Does Not Vouch for This Yarn, But Did It Happen?—Books' From Great Library, Underground Railway, Convenient Post Office, Handy Meals, Barber Shops, Bathand a COVATAE (-\u.a\.f “THERE ARE VARIOUS FORMS OF EXERCISE.” wonderful sensation one enjoys after|lery trying to pick out congressmen having eased his weary form into a|from their district, also casting long- nl e marble tub fllled with water|ing eyes at the examples of manly drawn just at the right temperature | pulchritude assembled on the floor; is one worth coming miles for, to say [and 1 saw beautifully gowned women nothing of the “pep” comes after the cold shower. * % ¥ ¥ &(BEING a lover of art, I spent near- feeling that|nodding pleasantly to friends on the floor of the Senate. Nighttime, came and a friend of mine sent over to the Congressional Library, via that little road that connects the two buildings, 1y all of Wednesday examining | for two books that I had not yet read, the wonderful art gems that the Cap-iapnd, armed with these, I once more itol contains. My, luncheon on thi day was secured in the House restau- rant, while I had my dinner at the Senate cafe. I alternated between the restaurants, so that my face went Into hiding. * ok ok ok ‘KTHAT evening I did not sleep as well, evidently the effects of would not become too famillar, but|jjgrening to the tariff debate. Friday 1 really think that this fear Was|morping I did not feel like eating groundless, as the Capitol is so full |y aakrast, so busied myself with ot sightseers and lobbylsts that the | eading the Congressional Record and average stranger does not Attract|ygiking through the lower corridors couhme ~uen y “THEY HAVE A GYMNASIUM.” meither starching nor ironing, the kind that you wash out at night, wring the water out of them, hang up «nd 1h the morning they are ready to use. This, together with a tooth- brush and an extra pair of hose, which 1 carried in my hip pocket, completed my outfit. * % % % 'nHAvn:G finished breakfast on Tuesday morning, I spent the early hours calling upon numerous friends and discussing with them the legislative problems of the day. This time I had luncheon in the Senate office restaurant. “q listened to the tarift debate with great interest, especlally the Toll calls. As there was a night session, 1 was kept amused, perhaps I should say entertained, until about 10 o'clock, when 1 went to the place, where I was to spend the night, a different location, because two nights in sucoession In one room might at- tract attention. Wednesday morn- ing I had breakfast in the Senate restaurant, and as that body conven- ed at an earlier hour than usual my presence thers was not noticed, more especially because a number of the employes often take breakfast at 9 or 10 o'clock, having chosen to come to the office early and work during the quiet hours of the early morning. Being a bit fed up, as our English cousins would say, on debates, 1 spent the day wandering around the Capitol, following the crowds of visitors and listening to the yams the guldes wove for them, and some of the comments made by the visitors were interesting If not Qluminating. 1 did this all day long, and having tramped many miles over the hard floors I retired to another piding place, footsore and weary. “On Tuesday I wrote letters and telograms in the Capitol, to say noth- ing of having telephoned to friends outside, using the public booth near the Senate end of the Capitol. When I arose Wednesday morning I real- ized that & bath would make me feel much better and I want to say that the bathrooms at both ends of the Capitol are delighttul places, and the much attention. However, I wanted to play safe. Thursday morning I felt in need of some exercise, so I visited the gymnasium and had a good half-hour workout, to say noth- ing of the fun I had with an Indoor golt machine that & friend of mine uses during the winter months at home. I put in the day Thursday ex- ploring the Capitol proper, exploring it from one end to the other, even going down to the place where the big fans suck In the fresh air hurl 1t on its way up to the cham| of the Senate office building. “This day I had lunch at the res- taurant in the Senate office bullding, afterward paying my respects to the senators from my state. I again lis- tened to the debates, but tiring of this quite quickly.I went down to watch the machinery that is used In the ventilating system of the Capitol. 1 had an early dinner and retired. 1 was, however, awakened by the sounds of music and speaking. I had entirely overlooked the fact that some of my friends and fellow-conspirators might have Installed a radiophone. When this form of entertainment ceased I returned to my couch ana dia not awaken until late Saturday morning. “I had a combination luncheon and breakfast in the cafs of the House office building, after which I visited a committee room in the House office buflding and saw many beautiful flags, army trophies and a complete set of war medals, I then took the elevator to the basement floor and crossed over to the Senate office building and entered the room where the exhibits of the dye industry are housed, and it really is remarkable how dyes, perfumes, etc, are made out of coal tar and other products. Again securing the services of my friend I secured some additional books, because I knew that the next day, Sunday, was going to be a long and tedious period of time. In ad- dition to having secured reading ma- terial for the long Sunday, I also pro- vided myself with a number of sand- wiches and pleces of cake, for 1 knew full well that the restaurants would not be open and that to send in meals from an outside place would cause my being asked to leave the “AND A TURKISH BATH” where the solons sit and make our laws. I saw the spot which was in- tended to bé the last resting place of the Father of His Country; I gazed upon the marble features of the three pioneers of woman suffrage; I saw them handle boeks by the thousands in the folding room and I watched the reporters fling their messages In the press galie: I saw prominent statesmen being shaved or having their hair cut; I watched keen- eyed secretaries flitting through the corridors and disappearing into com- mittes rooms; I saw aged claimants buttonholing congressmen, asking thelr a1d; I saw flappers In the gal- bullding and this would result in th loss of the wager already nearly won. * ¥ X ¥ ¢¢QUNDAY 1 spent reading and sleep- ing, and I was glad indeed when T heard secretaries and clerks arriv- ing st their posts of duty on Monday morning. Had I desired to leave the city on Monday, I could have had a friend secure & railroad ticket and berth for me, for there is a ticket office on the first floor of the Capitol right near the woman suffrage mar- ble group. “ really must confess that while I set out to do, I had also passed a very tiresome week, and while I was able to carry on my business from the Capitol of ths United States, there was a feeling of restraint and a fear of discovery that made my sojourn in these bulldings anything but pleas- ant. You can readily imagine how it feels to be constantly watching for some one to discover you in & place where you have no right to be, and while the territory to which I had voluntarily exiled myself was large in acreage, the feeling of confine- ment was most pronounced, and I can feel more strongly than I ever imag- ined I could how & man must feel who has been sentenced to serve a term In jail. “While T had the satisfaction of knowing that I am the only man who has ever performed this feat and that two charities have had their treas- uries enriched thereby, .yet I would not undertake to pass a similar week again for many times the amount of the wager.” Artificial Eyes. ESIDES the artificial limbs the construction of which has de- rived unwonted actually from the war, the manufacture of artificlal eyes has for some time been most ex- tensive. So far from being a mere esthetic question, this, In fact, Is a matter of the highest practical, hygienical importance. Artificial eyes are manufactured in a rather interesting way. To the flattened end of a colorless, transpar- ent enamel stick there is first applied the pupll, after which the iris is formed plastically by means of thin, sharpened, colored enamel sticks. Or else, an even more satisfactory, though more laborious, process, the lines and circles of the Iris are traced with the aid of pulverized enamel and well melted into the back- ground. F An enamel tube of the color of the sclerotic and closed at the front end is blown out ovally and pierced in front, the edges of the hole being. by means of a little stick of enamel pressed uniformly round and slight- ly convex. The iris is now inserted into the aperture by means of the colorless stick and well melted in. After then melting off the enamel stick, 2o as only to leave the cornea, this s well rounded off and joined with the eye of the eye. The velns, which are always more or less vis- ible on the white, are finally applied by means of a stick of red enamel. In especially difficult cases the sur- roundings of the eye, skin, evelids, etc., must even be imitated by means of glass parts, mounted on silver plates and fixed to the patient's eye- glass. Such work, of course, demands the highest skill, but is done with such perfection that the imitation can frequently be detected only by the experienced eve of the expert. Attempts have been made from time to time to manufacture artj- fical eyes of a less fragile materlal than glass (e. g.. vulcanite or cellu- loid), but no satisfactory results have 80 far been obtained in this connec- tion. A Famous Road. I'l' is contended that the Grand Trunk road of India is the most romantic highway in the world. A stately ave- nue of three roads in one—the cen- ter of hard metal, the roads on each side ankle-deep in silvery dust, fring- ed by a double row of trees—runs for 1.400 miles through the vast southern plain that skirts the Himalayas, from Calcutta to far Peshwar, which keeps sentinel at the gate of Afghanistan. From horizon to horizon it stretches like & broad white ribbon, as straight as if traced by a gigantic ruler. And dotted along the entire length are hundreds of serats—wayside rest houses—each with its arched and tur- reted gateway, its spacious inclosure, where humans share shelter with oxen, camels and goats, and its cen- tral well of sparkling water. For three thousand years the Hima- layas have looked down on this road and have seen It as they see it today. It has witnessed & hundred genera- tions of men come and go: & score of dynasties rise and fall. And yet to- day it 18 to the eye exactly the same as In the long-gone time when Nine- veh was a proud city. Primitive Amphibian. THE land vertebrates of the coal era were amphibious animals, half reptiles, half fish. Bones and skeletons of the Eryops, the largest and best known of these amphiblans in America, are occasionally found in the upper coal measures of Penn- sylvania, but the best specimens are from Texas. Fhe Eryops is twice as old as the Brontosaurus, five times as old as the Eohippus—the diminutive ances- tor of the horse—one hundred times old as the mammoth or the masto- don or the earliest known remains of man. It has been sald of the Eryops that he is a collateral ancestor of all the higher animals—of reptiles, birds, memmals, and of man himself—all developed, through the ages which have since elapsed, from animals of the. same type and grade of organi- zation, and may serve at least to raise our respect for the possibilities of development which lay In the primative amphibia. Land of Many Horses. ONE of the government scientists cites some interesting facts about ancient American horses. It appears that in North America there were al- ways from four to six entirely different varities of the horse family, llving cotemporaneously. Some were slow moving and relative- 1y broad-footed horses, living fn the forests, others were very swift. hav- ing narrow feet more resembling those of deer, and lived on the plains. Moreover, there were American horses larger than thé huge Percher- ons of today, and others smaller than the most diminutive Shetlands. Strangely enough, the greatest beauty and varlety in the develop- ment of the horse family were exhibit- ed here just before the total extinc- tion of the ancient horses on tl American continent, & catastrophe ‘which still offers an unsolved problem had accomplished the thing I bad'for investigation. THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. Trilby May and the Tooters 1922—PART 4. How the Bunch at the Room of the Green Tubs Found a Way to Play the Same Game as the Rollers—Brotherly Broadcasting Becomes a Science as Art - Friends Gather on a Kitchen Roof—Expert Advice Turns Gloom Into Enthusi- asm, While Hard-Luck Stories Are Banished—Initiations Become Popular. BY SEWELL FORD. ND now 1 expect that some day the Room of the Green Tubs will be as famous as Old Tom’s or the Cheshire Cheese, or Dor- lan's Beanery on Park row. In spite of the name, it isn’t one of those Greenwich Village tourist traps—noth- ing like that. And it's hardly a room. In fact, it's only the kitchen roof of Tortoni’s that has been covered with a groen-and-white-striped awning and ‘partly screened in by a hedge of privet set in butter tubs painted a sickly green. Perhaps Barry Platt and I are the only ones who expect fame to come to the Room of the Green Tube, for we not only named it, but we invented it. That is, it was our hunch, which we passed on to Signor Tortoni, that he could ease the congestion in his second-floor dining space by cutting French doors through one of the back windows, flooring over the kitchen roof, and putting a few iron tables out there. True, that foxy son of Napoll not only adopted the idea, but pinched it outright. Why, he even had the nerve to exhibit it to us, soon after the Job was finished, as the result of his own brilliant scheming. We let him get away with that, but when he wanted to advertise it as his Hanging Garden we crabbed the act. “Old stuff, Tortoni,” I protested. “And much too pretentious. You ought to ring In something about those tubs.” “That's it!” says Barry. *The Room of the Green Tubs.” * * mised by not naming it at all and let- ting us call it anything we ‘wished. Anyway, nearly all the regulars of this spaghetti joint seem to have followed our lead, although most of them sim- ply ask Joe, the head waiter, it he can give them a table “‘up among the green tubs.” So one of the first things Barry and 1 did after we blew into town from our big spring tour with Uncle Nels was to look up some of the old crowd and arrange a get-together dinner st Tortoni's. Took us more than a week, at that, for in New York you don't casually rum into friends and acquaintances. Not as a rule. Generally you call them up on the phone about three times before you get in touch with them, and then more than likely they are dated up for some time ahead. But we had rather good luck, and at last—one of those perfect nights such as we had a few of not long ago—nearly half a dozen of us were gathered around a big table under the striped awning. And somehow, for the first time sinoe we'd gotten in from Florida, we seemed to be really at home. I expect there are spots like that for all kinds of people, in all kinds of places. For the young hicks of Tamarack Junction it used to be the Superior Pool Parlor, back of Felt- ner’s general store: but I suppose the old boys who toddle into the Union Lengue Club here in New York have much the same sensation of being among their own kind when they slump into their favorite easy chairs. Likewise the young Dago gangsters who slouch fnto a Mott street suey joint, or the Michigan tin-canners when they park their old flivvers within sight of Tampa bay once more and meet up with friends from Iowa and Indiana. Proving that home {sn’t always where the mortgage is, but may be anywhere that the friend- 1y hail is passed. Not that T mean to gush over Tor- toni's as the only real place in New York. I wouldn't even back the table d’hote dinner against the fleld. No. 1'd advise you to shy the little neck clams on principle and to pass up the cold-storage chicken most of the time. Also the view through gaps in the tubbed privet is far Jfrom allur- ing—that is, unless you can fisd scenic charm in the bdack of a four- story garage or the rear elevation of an apartment building. But Tortoni's potage Mongol is sa tasty a brew as I ever dipped & soup spoon into, and his spaghetti Espagnol is a noble and satistying concoction. Then, too, it is rather cozy on a warm June even- ing, sitting out among the green tubs, listening to the hum of the city and the clatter of the dish-washing ma- chine below, especially when you have your own bunch along. * %k Ok HAT night we had collected ‘Whitey Weeks, the demon press agent; Ames Hunt, who had rounded off his oareer as theatrical manager by discovering both Barry Platt and me the same season, and Sheila O’'Shea, who actually does magasine covers and sells ’em withont ever having lived in Greenwich Village. Later on there had drifted in one T. Sylvester Smith, who admits he is the most meteoric ad writer that has ‘broken into the game with the last six months, and a big. tousle-haired humorist from Denver—Ben Day, he signs himself—who s being tried out as editor of an evening newspap funny column. b So,you might guess that the table talk would be literary and arty. But it wasn't. Ames Hunt failed to grouch about a perfectly punk the- atrical season,”but told us about & guide he had up at Crooked Lake, Me., and how he tried to make soup out of some kodak films that he mis-. took for condensed consomme C&p- sules. Sheila O'Shea had discovered tfat Whitey had once lived In West Newton, Mass., within a block of where she was born, and they were digging up mutual acquaintanoss. Big Ben and I;lr;y :e;t talking golf. WITH the Brie cheese and ooffee though, the chat got a bit more shoppy. It generally does. Some one mentioned “More to be Petted,” the new flapper novel that so much is heing printed about, and T. Syl- vester promptly began to swing the hammer. He'd tried to read ths book and it had made him seasick; didn't call it & story at all, just & hash of nasty prep school gossip strung along on a thin thread and told in shrill * ¥ VVBII.E Torton! didn’t fancy that name at first, he finally compro- 1 shrieks which the author thought ‘was futuristic writing. “Beside! he added, “I knew of this Snooky Burr fellow when I was in college. He was a soph the year I almost got my degree and every one knew him for & rummy and & bounder. A morbid, pasty-faced little shrimp, he was, too, and I've no doubt he put into his book most of his own unsavory scrapes. Bah!™ “Still,” protests Sheila, “he’s made a big hit with it. Five printings in the first three months and the critics haven't quit talking about it yet. At least once a week you'll see an in- terview with Montague Burr. He gets almost as much space as that fellow Duff O'Brien and his creepy play, ‘The Stodger.” That's some- thing I can’t see at all.” “Few can,” agrees Barry, “and yet it has been so industriously boomed that it's still running. Of course, it's a novelty, and it may be art. I don't know. How do they get that way, these unknowns? That's what I'd like to dope out. Why doesn't some- body tell the world what a wonder I am, for & change? “Anid about me?” adds Sheila. “Here 1 am, doing classy color stuff for the same magazines as Netta Keefe; but do 1 win any personal paragraphs from the column conductors? 1 do not. And vet the funny sap who does the Crow's Nest s always ringing in something about Netta. It's all wrong, all wrong. Say, somebody pass the cigarettes.” “You should worry, Sheila,” says Barry Platt. “Read mine and weep. The night my first and ohly play opened in the Village there were two Broadway premieres, one of them a musical girl show, and all the re- views I got you could have pasted on a postcard. In fact, the only time my name was mentioned it got into print as Perry Blatt. How am I ever going to become a well known drama- tist with a start like that? While this Duft O'Brien person was hailed as a comer from the very start. How come, I'd like to know?” * % ¥ % AT whick Ames Hunt chuckles and favors the table with that crooked smile of his. *I'll tell you,” says he. “O'Brien was lucky enough to be taken up by the Rollers. So was Netta Keefe. So was Montague Burr, and all the others who have broken in. They found favor with the Rollers.” “I don't get yeu,” says I. “Who and what are the Rollers?” “The log rollers,” says Hunt. “They have accepted the term themselves, so I am quite free to use it. And since they did a good deal toward helping me at first, I hardly feel like giving them amy unkind words now. 1 didn’t choose to stay with them, but that was entirely my affair. How- ever, the Rollers have gone on and prospered, and today they come very near being the whole show in this town." “Yes, Y've heard of them,” says Barry, “but in a vague sort of way. They boost each other, don’t they, and bdelong to a mutual admiration society *“That 1s their working scheme, stated crudely and simply,” admits Hunt. “It's a case of you tickle me and I'l tickle you; you beat the tom-tom for my stuff and I'll beat it for yours. There's no denying, too, that it-fs much more helpful than a society of knockers. Of course, it does choke out real criticism; and oc- casionally, if not frequently, this log- rolling system does fool the dear public into buying trashy books or seeing poor plays or raving over bad art. But, on the other hand, the Rollers do encourage real genfus now and then. So there you are.” “But the genius must first make the grade with the Rollers,” objects Shella. "“And their organization is rather & close combine, 1 take it How did they start, anyway?" ‘Which seemed to be the cue that Ames Hunt had been waiting for. He smothered a cigarette stump “n the saucer of his coffee cup, lighted a fresh one refiectively, and then told us all about it. * % * ¥ €T was ten or a dozen years ago,” e began, “when I had come on {from Boston fully convinced that I had already achleved fame. Why not? I had staged a college play, and Td managed\a stock company that had almost paid expenses for one whole season. It was a great shock to learn that no one in New York had heard of me. Worse than that, none of the big producers ssemed to yearn: for my services. I couldn’t believe it for a while. Then my funds ran low and 1 mo.2d frem s the expensive hotel which I had honored with my presence to rather a cheap boarding house in the West Forties.” “A ham-fatiers’ prunery?” sugg ed Barry. “Not exclusively,” says Hunt. “There were two or three actors Tooming there, but the other profes- slons were represented. Some were newspaper Epace writers, one was & young cartoonist just in from Chi- cago and n recent arrival from San Francisco was heing tried out as sistant dramatic critis Also there was = splendid young chap from Brattleboro, Vt.,, who had a wonder- ful tenor voice, and a red-hatred girl from Des Moines who was trying hard to be an fllustrator. “We were all firmly cenvinced that we had amazing talent, and we were equally sure that all New York was in league to prevent us from getting a foothold. We used to sit around the dinner table in the dingy base- ment dining room and complain about things in general, but particularly as to how difficult it was for an un- known genius to get any kind of recognition. We knew that we were quite as good, each in our own line, as the old fogeys who were keeping us crowded out, and in most cases we suspected that we were better. But how to edge into the spotlight our- selves was a problem. So we took it out in knocking the ring—just as vou youngsters have been @oing to- night.” “Oh, I say!" protests Barrs. * x % % ‘l\ Y error,” apologizes Ames Hunt. 4*L “But T was going to tell you about Frank Steele. He didn't claim to be a genius. He was merely & voung law clerk in a big firm of corporation attorneys. He wasn't even trying to be a lawyer—just fitting himself to go back up to New Hampshire somewhere and help his father organize the wood pulp industry. He used to sit and listen to our tomplaints about how the world was using us without joining in. Finally, one night, when he got good and tired of it, T suppose. he un- Joaded a whole lot of pertinent remarks. He told us we gave him a pain. Don't be soreheads.’ he a@vised us. ‘That'll never get you anywhere. If the old timers refuse to admit how good you are, why not do It yourselves? Get together. Organize. And the way to start is by boosting each other. Do it every chance you get, private- 1y and publicly, in print and by word of mouth. Talk up each oth- er's stuff. And the first thing you know you'll be getting folks to be- lieve you. Then, if you really are any good, you'll get your chance to prove it’ “Well, that little talk of his sunk. We organized then and there. We promised to do all we could to make known the merits of each member of fhe clan. Most of us stuck to it, too. Thers were about a dogen at the start, and for a while it was a close corporation. Later on recruits were taken in. And, sure enough, we be- gan to get results. A lot of us ar- rived. To be sure, more or less dropped out, but that was because there wagn't enough to them. 1In spite of all our friendly boosting. they couldn’t deliver the goods. Those who could are well known in their various professions today. They are the Roilers.” “I know some of 'em,” says Barry. “But a Tat Iot of good that does me. 1 don’t notice any of them doing log- rolling for me.” “QOr for me, eithar,” échoes Sheila. “Say,” I breaks in, “if you simps will stop grouching and listen to me I'd like to propose something.” “Miss Trilby May Dodge, the tal- ented young comedienne, has the floor,” aanounces Big Ben, In his booming voice. “Shoot, Trilby May “All right,” says 1. “It isn’t such a novel hunch, after all wé've heard, but I rise to remark—if this boosting game is so easy to get away with, 't you try it on?” . says Barry. *“You mean—" “Quite 8o’ ys 1. “There's no copy- right on the idea, is there? And it strikes me weé have here the same kind of & bunch as the one Ames Hunt started out with. Well? Why don't you get together, beat the tom- tom for one another, toot each othe; horns, and—" “Cheers!” cuts in Big Ben. “You've shouted a whole earful, Trilby May. The Soclety of Tooter: name for you! All those in favor will | the course of a single year of wiggle thelr left ears. Carried! Charter members will please. qualify by signing their names on the back of the menu. Anybody got & foun- tain pen that isn't a family pet and can be risked among friends? Ah, thank you, Whitey! Now, we're off. The Tooters are ready to toot. * k%% THEH.E was more or less josh passed around the table, but every one was signing up, when T. Sylvester broke in with his doubts. “I'm with you to the last breath, of course,” says he, “but I must admit that I don't. quite see how it's all going to work out. How are we each to do an equal share of tooting? “That’'s precisely what we don't bother about, dear boy,” says Big Ben. “We each do what we can, when we can. For instance, I shall lead “GET TOGETHER. ORG AND THE WAY TO START IS BY BOOSTING EACH OTHER.» my column tomorrow or mnext day with that clever quip of yours about the Civic Virtue Statue in City Hall Park looking like a careless fat guy emerging from a subway rush. But instead of pinching it outright, as T would have done yesterday, I shall give you full credit. Oh, yes—T. Sylvester Smith, the talented ad writer.” “Honest? Will yqu?" asks Smithy. working up a rare biush. “Why— why, that would be simply bully, old man. All the fellows in my depart- ment would see it, you know. Some one might show it to my chlef and he would think—well, it would heip a lot, & thing like that.” “Sure it would,” says Big Ben. “And later I'd drag in something &bout the rest of you; a wheeze about Barry Platt, the well known dramatist; some reference to Sheila's latest cover de- sign, and a playful stab at Trilby May, the reformed flapper, and £o on.” “Thanks in advance, Mr. Day.” says I “But where do I horn in with any reciprocal lines?” “Oh, the inspiration will come to you,” says he. “Perhaps you will be moved to ask casual acquaintances if they don't think that Ben Day fellow isn't doing some perfectly screaming stuff in his column these davs. Or Smithy might have a chance to quote me in some of his ad copy.” “I know!" says Sheila. 1 do a caricature of you with your hair mussed, and work it off on some magazine. And I'l use Trilby May's head in my next cover.” “That's all there is to tooting,” says Big Ben. “Who gives a hang for the Rollers now? We'll show 'em a trick or two, and if they think they can do all the brotherly broadcasting they're out of tune with the main station, that's all. Now let's go to it.” * ¥ k X WYELL. if anything comes of it that's how the thing began. That first session of ours happened two weeks ago, and twice since thén we have gathered in thé room of the Green Clubs to report progress and vote on taking in new members. T think young Smithy is the most rabid Tooter of the lot, just now. He says the printing of that one paragraph got him noticed by the vice president of his firm, and that he egpects & raise next month. Barry Platt is all puffed up over seeing his name print- ed mso conspicuously, and Sheila is thinking of a larger studio. As for me, I'm trying to be modest about the prospects of seeing my car- rotty hair and green eyes being d played on ten thousand newsstands. Also I've done my best to explain to Inez why a Sunday editor should send a lady reporter up to ask me to tell his readers “Why is a flapper?” ~1 suppose it's because of that plece Ben Day put in his column about me,” says 1. “Huh!" says Inez. “Why he prints what you say about flappers? Why don't he ask me something?” “For the simple reason, old dear,” says 1, “that you're not a Tooter and 7 am.” “What' mands. “To givé you all the details, Inez,” says I, "would be revealing the se- crets of our order’ But I can whis- per, In strict confidence, thé genecral idea.” “Well?" says she, stretching an car. “A Tooter, Inez,” says 1, “is vne who toots.” {Copsright, 1922, by Sewoll Ford.) ———— that, & Tooter?” she de- A scientist has calculated that the eyelids of the average man open and There's a|shut no fewer than 4,000,000 times in his existence. v | '