Evening Star Newspaper, November 25, 1923, Page 81

= » i Visitor Behind the Scenes at Fontainebleau, Near Paris, Introduced to Colony of Aristocrats, . Séholars and Engineers Who Engage in Imgressive Dances and Perform Menial Duties in the Course of a Day—Declared Most Amazing perfo_rmance of the Sort Ever Observed—Seck Spirit of Indifference to Ordinary React:‘on_s. At Fontainebleau, near Paris, there 15 a curlous colony of people who claim to be on the road to learning the true way to live, to be delving with success | into the hidden secrets of existence and of ultimate happiness, and to be evolving powers which an outsider would term miraculous. They are presided over by a mysterl- ous, powerful figure, an adept in east. ern ‘‘magic,” to whom they submit themselves in everything they do or think. . The Institut Gurdjieft represents the first organized effort to bring to the western world those peculiar exercises and practices developed in India -and Thibet. This article represents the Impres. sions of a writer who recently visited the institut. BY ERNEST BRENNECKE. T was with the keenest anticlpa- tion of an exciting, perhaps even dangerous, adventure that I descended with my gulde into the lovely gardens of the Chateau d: Prieure as night began to fall. u Here I was, committed as it were for a nizht at the Institut Gurdjleff, where, according to rumors that had been fitting along the Paris boulevards, weird actfvities were indulged in and magic from the east was practiced by a strange group of people from all over the world; aristocrats, mil- Jionaires, doctors of philosophy, en- &ineers and students. Here, as cafe gossip had it, bizarre chants dis- turbed the sleep of Fontainebleau during the early hours of the morn- ing. Here persons of noble birth were forced to scrub floors or attend to the pigs. Here was a luxurious orfental chamber where wild, fan- tastic dances were performed all night long. In this huge garden, where foun- tain§ played, illuminated by sub- maerged red and green electric lights, some one was playing a piano under- peath the trees across the broad lawn. White-robed figures began to appear from nowhere and to fill up the place. A high, impatient voice cried out from the direction of the chateau as a group of about twenty disciples, men and women, assembled {fn the center of the garden, a large, smooth, grassy stage, bordered by banks of flowers. “That voice is Gurdjieff," explained my gulde, Maj. Pinder, who had com- nded British forces in Siberfa be- fore becoming a follower of this new prophet. INOW the pianist had modulated into a rhythmic, pounding tune in & minor key, the clangor of the quasi-oriental chords echoing strange- {1y through the dusk. At another | shout from Gurdjieff the figures on | the lawn arranged themselves in sev- cral rows, stood perfectly rigid for a few minutes, and then began to move their arms in unison—rapid, Jerky movement. their joints giving the beautiful effect of working on j ball beartngs. The music quickened its pace, and so did the arms. Now and bodies began to sway this and that, heads bobbed fran- from side to side. Arms, legs, GURDJIEFF (GORGIADES), A MYSTERIOUS, POWERFUL LEADER, ADEPT . IN EASTERN MAGIC. stood as if petrified in unimaginably bizarre attitudes, Rain began to fall, destroying the spell of the thing, and the group ol dancers liquefied, percolating slowly into a low wooden house. | We arose from our bench and foi- lowed. This house is the temple, or hall of ‘Ilul‘“r!. We entered through a low | doorway, passed through a corridor, and- straightened up in a chamber ! which transported one at once into | an_eastern realm. The walls were covered with brilliant, fantastic tapestries, except where they | were plerced by colored windows. Tiers The most rigid discipline seemed hands and heads acted in complete! of luxuriously cushioned divans were to be exacted by this amazing leader. Gurdjieff, I was told, had been born and christened by his Greek parents as George S. Gorgiades in the Trans- caucaslan town of Alexandrople some fifty years ago. As a boy he had wwandered through Russia, had run away to sea, had then traveled all through the east, especlally through outer mongolia and Thibet, where he had becoge saturated in the mystlc religions * and magic practices of Lamas, Sufis, Yogis and Perslan der- vishes. He had fled to Constantinople during the Russlan revolution, and had finally established this institute for the study and practice of oriental philosophy, miracle-making and su- per-physical culture in this pictur- esque and beautiful chateau in the Fontainbleau forest. AT WORD OF COMMAND, THE D&Nsm independence of one another, and each dancer scemed to be executing a series of movements different from his neighbor's, yet the total effect of the group was harmonious as it shifted with electrical rapidity from one pattern into another, the music meanwhile waxing wilder and louder and more and more insistent, as if intoxicated with the spirit and aban- don ‘of the whole performance. In- comparably the most amazing danc- ing I had ever seen. In comparison the best of the Russian ballet seemed child's play. Don't imagine there was anything sensual about It, be- cause there was no suggestiveness ‘whatever. Another shout, a dim, gray figure ’n\ovcd rapidly down the lawn, the | music ceased abruptly, the dancers , CEASE ABRUPTLY, AS E COMPANY, ROSE. ranged on either side, whence the spec- tators watched the proceedings. At the farther end was a polished Wwooden dancing floor, fitted out like a gym- naslum with instruments of quaint workmanship; at the other stood a cur- tajned pavilion, from which Gurdjiefr, still invisible, directed the proceedings. Between the two there was a rafled off inclosure, covered with Persian rugs, re- eerved for the white gowned young men and women—the initiated disciples. Some forty of them filed in and squatted down, Buddha-fashion, the men on one side, the women on the other. * x %k ¥ 8 I leaned back among the cushions, lighting a cigarette and feeling much like Haroun-al-Raschid, another plano inside began again its discourse in ancient intervals, and the disciples once IF FROZEN, IN THE MOST DIFFICULT POSTURES more entered into their angular, Kinetic | contortions. The dance again ceased abruptly. the performers holding eeemingly impos- sible poses. The curtains of the pavil- fon parted, and Gurdjieff stepped into the full glare of the lights, which had been wavering fitfully between bril- liance and darkness during the ballet. He was & rather tall, powerfully built man, carelessly dressed In a gray loungé | suit, walking with a slouching ‘gait. The hair of his head was cropped short, | displaying a large spherical skull. Slightly squinting eves, full, wide nos- trils and & mouth hidden by a drooping | mustache betrayed little or no emotion; | except, perhaps, a species of cold amuse- | ment. Perhaps, also, more than a faint trace of cruelty. A cigarette drooped from one corner of his mouth. | He advanced toward a young man who was balancing himself precariously on twisted legs, with arms etiffly out-| stretched, and roughly pushed him over. The white figure toppled to the floor, rolled over a few times, and then| achieved equilibrium, still retaining his | difficult posture. i After more dances, including a dizzy | Tout of whirling dervishes, the master | announced that memory feats and! demonstrations of thought-transference | would take place. T glanced at my watch as at last we came out into the sweet night air. It was 2:30 am. But no one else showed the slightest sign of weariness, White figures could still be seen every- where, smoothing out the paths, rear- ranging the benches and doing. other | chor They work - systematicaliy to break | all their habits, both good and bad, thus | freeing their whole lives from tha ordi- nary man's usual slavery to habits, and performing every act Wwith all their at- tention. They live the communal life, | just as the earllest Christian churches | did, but they do mnot regard their rhythmic exercises as rites or cere- monies. They regard communal life as necessars for producing in highly con- centrated form all the friction, all the reactions, pleasant and unpleasant, that are met with in ordinary life. Indif- ference to these reactions is one of their goals. It is a curious and picturesque oasis of spirituai devotion and self-surrender in the midst of a buzzing, rather ma- teriailstic world. O the gditor: Well a great| many people has wrote in | lately with a personal appeal | to please not bore them to | death with articles in regards to what has happened in my family af- fairs and what I been doing lately and etc, but it has been my ambition for a long wile to bore people and at least the people in question will half to admit that I have been suc- cessful along these lines but in or- ders to make insurance doubly sure it looks like I would half to write a fow more wds. on the lines of what hae been happening in our family af- tairs and which very fow writers would have the nerve to touch but I, am different. 1 Well about 3 wks. ago I happened | to come down for breakfast onel morning and greatly to my surprise it turned out to be‘a Saturday. fioI the little woman says what was you planning to do over the week end. So I says well I was planning to run down to a place called Princeton, N. J., and see a foot ball game. o she says: “Was you planning to go alone?’ So I says: “No it looks like they would be a big crowd thero as Princeton s vs. Notre Dame who they say has got & pretty falr foot ball nine who it | might be worth my whilo seeing s INotre Dame is elght miles from my home and if they happen to wan I might not be so grouchy around the house.” So she says how about me going with you and I says that was my in- tensions all the time so we went to Princeton and seen the game and seen Notre Dame win by the hair line margin of 25 to 2 and afterwards we come home and I picked up a couple N. Y. papers in the next few days and they was storys in them by eastern foot ball coaches that the senses of opinion was that the reason Notre Dame had wan was on acct. of them having 2 wks. head start in their practice and besides when a Eastern team plays anybody but Harvard or Yale, why they don't want to win. * X ¥ ¥ THAT is & important fact for ex- perts to remember, namely that when & team like Notre Dame beats one of the big thres, why it is be- cause the last named don’t want to /| policemen & others weaker than our- VEMBER 25, To Editor The BStar, who realizes how it must be more expensive to Glve than to Receive. BAREST SIR:—All great cal- ammities should be prepared in advance, should not? It should. For examplus, ob- serve how Hon, Wm. G. Hohenzol- lern, efficlency axpert of Germany, work for forty (40) yrs. getting ready to make Europe missable. And that were not long enough. It are very high time, then, for all persons to start Xmas so that they can get over with it sooner. In time of Peace prepare for Xmas (quotation.) About 2 weeks of yore Mrs. C. W. Quackmire, my owner, approach to Kitchin with international expres- slon peculiar to Hon. CHas. E. Hughes. “Togo,” she assimilate, “Xmas are the most unportant jolliday of all the round year. Therefore we must be- ( have like little Christians.” | “O horrus!" I dictate. “Will it be | rough llke tha | “Retain yourself,” she dib. “When | I speek thusly I mean something else. | For Instancely. When you go shop | to buy tablecloth or fingerbowel or| gin or tie (neck and oxford) with which to donate happy joy to chil- dren, clergy & others, why should you not go early? I tell you why. Xmas | re time of kind sweetness, are not? It are. Hearts should explode open to do good deeds. Money no objeck. For instancely, I have been saving my knickels long time to buy my dearfe Husband a emmerald bracelet which I have needed since last April | Foolish Da: “How can you compel him to wear | it I require baffably. “I shall wear it for him” she ob- tain. “For he would love to see It| around my elbow more than his. This | give him pleasure.” 1 stand ghast for that phenomenal. “And so onwards” she diploma. Xmas Spirit teach us to be kind to selves. We should cansider the sore back & tired eyebrows of those what work to make us happy. Think of poor shopgirls, entirely with work, roshing thither & hither | all Xmas week, selling clgarette ! holders for young ladies who already got 27 just like it! Are it not pretty babbarous, by golly, to drive poor Shopgirl so gogglishiy that she lose | her mind and forget where she put| her gum?” ' “How can I stop this disgustedly| habit?” I ask to know. | * k& ¥ J 6J)0 vour Xmas Shopping Prema- turely,” corrode Mrs. C. “' Quackmire. “Go now and avold the| rosh. shopworn 1923—PART 5 Pr()duces Picturesque Ceremonies Wallace Irwin’s Lettefs of a Japanese Schoolboy. “THEY GET JUMBLED INTO TENSE MOBB OF LADIES.” | with roses all over her face while| selling. Do you not desire to do | 800d deed each day?” _"1 are a Bpy Scouch,” I manipulate. ‘And what are more fatting to sweet Xmas thoughts than to know we have brought happiness to lower persons we mest on soclal scales? O it are great blessing to be kind. It gets the heart all hot. It make friendship between the up classes and the down classes. That, Togo, are Spirit of Xm “I agree tg.it” This from nfe. “And, Togo.” She stop by doorside. “While I remembes to think about it. we are golng to have dinner for 22 persons to morra night. Besides cooking {t, please serve it also. And permit me tell you. s Last dining party I gave you kep me awake washing| This time you | must be quleter about it or I shall try | dishes after 2 am. skin you alive.” Slam door. I stand on myself, thinking Xmas. Do Your Xmas Shopping Prema- turely. When I had poked lunch at Mrs. Quackmire and bathed the lunch. Call at oncely at counter of | ing dishes it was Thusdy afternoon, |y dept. store & observe happy Shopgir! | p.m.. and I decide take my layoff at| girl strength.” LARDNER SEES NOTRE DAME GAME Sometimes the Teams Don’t Want to Win. He Says. “I SAYS TO THE LITTLE W&){g\fll\';wflow CAN YOU BEAT THE win and further and more the results 18 on acct. of the western team hav- ing 2 wks. more Dractice though per- sonly it looked to me like the Tigér a8 I call them could of uged 4 more yrs. practice and made a tie game out of it and that would of satisfied them as they don't want to win. At this junction it should be stated in justice to old Bill Roper, the Princeton coach, that his printed criticlsm of the game was to the ef- feot that Notre Dame had & pretty fair foot ball nine and after they had played & hr. or €0 they sent in & substitute backfleld and the last named was better than Team No. 1 and I wished you could of seen them, to say nothing about the line. On the way back to N. Y. eity I says to the little woman, how can you beat the Irish when it comes to foot ball. She had mo reply ready. The best backfleld Notre Dame seem- ed to have was Stuhldreher, Miller, Borgman and Leyden. The last named may be a Greek. Well we finely got home and I says to the little gal what are we going to do with the rest of the | evening, as I am feeling very fresh. So she says let the telephone take care of itself and in about a % of a hr. a'party called up and sald how would you Iltke to play cards. L O my answer was obvious, namely 1 would like to play without cheating. But they wanted to play stud poker. So pretty soon we had a 6 hand game running in full tilt and it lasted till three o'clock in the morn- ing as the song hath it, and when we come to settle up I had wan-11 cents ond the Mra had loose 9 cents The First Telegraphic Message T is sald that, hidden away In the archives of the Tennessee Histor- fcal Society at Nashville is the a eount of the first actual message sent over a telegraph line. That dis- patch differs materially from the solemn message that passed over the wire between Washington and Balti- more in the year 1844. It {llustrates well, however, the lack of seriou: ness with which Morse's invention was taken when he first offered it to the world. Adcording to the account preserved at Nashville, Robert L. Caruthers of Lebanon, Tenn., was a member of Congress in 1843, and a member of the committee to which was referred Morse's application for an appropria- tion to build a telegraph line from ‘Washington to Baltimore. Most of the members of the committee looked upon Morse a3 & visionary and his proposal as impracticable. On the last day of the session Merse went to the committee room and told them that he had stretched & wire to the top of the Capitol building, and bad & youns man up there. If they would write a mes- sage he would send it up; and the voung man would brfng them a copy of it, Nobe of them belisved it could be done. Judge Caruthers, however, pulled the envelope of a letter out of his pocket and wrote a message. Morse, who had his instrument with bim, sat down and sent the message. In a few minutes the young man walked into the room with an exact ‘copy of the message. The committee reported favorably and recommended the appropriation. The bill passed just befors ad- Journment. Some one went to Morse's boarding house to inform him that the appropriation was made. The daughter of the landlady went to Morse's room, awakened him, and &ave him the welcome news. He sald to her, “My daughter, you shall send the first message that goes from ‘Washington to Baltimore.” That promise was fulfilled when she sent the famous message: “What hath God ‘wrought!"” Judge Caruthers was an ardent whig, and in 1843 the whigs were very angry with President Tyler, whom they accused of betraying the party. The melsage that Judge Car- uthers sent from the committée room to the young man at the top of the Capitol was: “Tyler deserved to de 1 Dept. Store where I could be kind toi working girls because I are one of | such. I eshould get there early—O so| prematurely! 3Maybe I should be first | one on the propity and find plenty Shopgirls with nothing to do but loal around & tell me the biography of thelr lives. Mr. Editor, are it not pleasure to go 4th with an originnal I D.. Answer | is, Yes. Therefore I go hunt up the most enlarged Dept. Store thers was. I | stood ghast with my 23 bill in my i pocket. How could I spent it épar- tially) & give Yaletide pleasure to a | 8reat majority of Japanese friends? | Inrushing toward door I could see an enormalous number of egger peo- ple (female) going in that direction. What was' this? I am at a loss o now. eral angry umburellas poke me between my wrists and elbows while 2 or 3 Ladies nearly six (8) ft. across melted together right in front | of where I walked. “O Dot, you here also?’ holla one ! (1) femtnine to other. “Yes, Kitten,” decry 2nd Wide Lady. 1 are determined I shall do my Xmas hopping early. It saves poor Shop- “YES, I WANT YOU YO BE ON EQUAL TERMS FOR ONCE.” 50 I trled to settle with mine banker for 2 oents but he did not have change for a nickel. That is life. Well the next night the telephone rung and it was Raymond Hitchcock the comic and he says we are going to have a spiritual meeting over to our house and would like you to come over. So I says why, and he says well I would just llke you to come over. So I gays well do you want me to talk with some dead people. So he says: “Yes, I want you to be on egual terms for once.” That is about all T can tell you in regards to Long Island this mo, = RING W. LANDNER NG (Copyright, 1923.) Plants Give Light. '‘HE list of organisms, animals and plants reported to give oft light occasionally is very large. Those that babitually and undoubtedly do so are not many and the function is littls understood. Various observations tend to show, with reference to so-called phosphorescent mushrooms, that, In fungl, at least, a vital function akin to respiration is seen in the emission of light, and that it {s accompanied by oxidation of tissue and the giving off of carbonic acld. Phosphoresence, or the faculty of emitting a visible light In darkness, 1s found clearly in certain groups of the animal kingdom, especially In in- sects and myriapods; it is rarer and less characteristic in plants. Oniy certain plants found in Brasll would appear certainly to possess a juice that is phosphorescent at a high tem- perature. Linnaeus relates that his daughter saw Intermittent flashes from various flowers of a yellow-orange tint. Tre- viranus doubts this observation and advances the hypothesis that orange color seen in half darkness may affect the eye in such a deceptive way as to give an {llusion of fugitive gleams. It this be so, phosphoroscence in the vegetable kingdom should be almost exclusively relegated to the mush- rooms. Here, however, the phenome- non is very decided. Decayed wood is sometimes phosphorescent. This is attributed to the presence in the dead wood of the substance of a phosphor- escent mushroom.' Perhaps it must be ascribed to bacteria, living either on the wood or en the.substance itself. “Indeedly it do!" stabber No. 1 Fat. I hurry here to day to purchase a dustproof potato smasher for my son Ruppert who have just got mar- ried to a very Dear i1Grl." ILE saying this they get jumbdled into tense mobb of ladles, all en~ rushing forward with expression pe- culiar to mad hippopotamusses. On right, on left I could hear squeezed lungs saying sweetishly, “I believe in doing Xmas shopping early, not so Mabi1?” At lastly I got Inside. In Needle. Underware & Eggbeater Dept. I could see 100000000 ladies clabber around with expression pecullar to Irish wanting to meet lloyd-Geo. In amidet of it all I could tell a Shopgirl by the frightened arrangement of her hairs. With one hand she were selling Ex- celsfor Woolen Onion Suits while with another she make change, endorse a check, demonstrate a Fireless Gas Stove and tell a Lady from Ferncliff that her child (male) must keep his feet out of the dressshields. Good time enjoved by all, maybe. “Thank you, Mudam, if .you will ushing me down with your annoy another Shopgirl who were selling 50c kneckties. “How horrud of you,” snarrel this Mudam. “When I have came here early, purposely to save your strength.” On Ird, 18th & 44th floor it were all equally the same. In Birdcage Dept. 13 ladles was having a battle around a Stamese Crow what they all bought simontaneously s 88c. In the Pum- pelan Music Saloon too many persons were tempting to hear free concert on the Itallan Peccadillo by Prof. Kelll. Deaths was instantanous while can- siderable people were being carried off to Red Cross Dept. where they were denatured and sent home. In meantime, what should I buy® My cousin Nogi have so frequently asked me for & suit of clothes & = (motor boat that I almost thought of that. But 2§ cannot go so long, even in these days of intense bargains. For 23 & 88 1 couid get one (1) Austra- lian parasol for Uncle Nichi But I could not find the change. What then? I should love very dearly to buy a Dbottel of polsoned perfume for Miss Kikusan who got married without my consent, bat Drug Store Dept. werc o filled with people that I could not get one of my edges in. I stood befront of one enormalous plaster Sandy Klauz statte, holding a Xmas Tree marked “Give Her a Pair of Our Moth Proof Hoslery— They Will Last Longer Than She Does.” 1 cansider that offering, but could not stay there because a mobb of swift ladies knock me down 2ce and I was too moved to stop. With all the skin oft my nervus system at lastly I took elevator down to 11th floor where Hon. Operatta holla, “Grocerles, Shoes, Plannas and Garden Seed: By getting off I knew I could soo something there for Xmas present. Who could miss it from so many? But beforo I stood up I was pounced thither & back by another pogrom of Early Shoppers. Around Fly Swatter Counter a pair of Swedish ladies was fighting a duel. Beside Temperance Cocktail Shaker Counter a purple Venus (colored) could not move until her hat-pin camo loose from my ear. “I cannot axcuso vou for that!" She bellus & walk away with bustle. 0 what could I? I came there, had not, to do my Xmas shopping prematurely? Yet everywhere I go I get knocked somowhere else. Tou much persons around, by golly! Howeverly, the unfortunate are born lucky. Somebody ramm me so hard that I went right up against the Butter & Egg Dept. How fortnate! 2% inches from my chin I observe the shopworn face of Hon. Shopgirl, look- ing calm but nervus. “What wished, 1f anything?’ she narrate while 18 ladies pull off her hair in hopes she would listen better. “I wish puchase 1 doz. eggs, slight Xmas present for S. Wanda, Japanesc Soclalist, who are in hospital enjoy- ing a billious.” This for me. “Are it not a wee early to buy Eggs for Xmas?” she broncho. “Egge are fresher when they are earlier, are not?" I snuggest. “88c per doz,” she commence, but could mot got past those words be- cause too tired. Of suddenly shé wrapped herself up and fell ove: I pick her up with intense chivalry in my elbow. “O, Mr. Sir,”-she s & grone, “could yoir not be more pittitull to working gel & do Xmas SQopping at a less crushy time? “When would that be, if conven- fent?” I ask to know. “About 3 weeks after Xmas” she wale, and when nextly seen she car- ried away, entirely uselesa. Hoping you are the same, Yours truly Hashimura Toge,