Evening Star Newspaper, February 15, 1925, Page 39

Everyday Religion Not a Talk on Theology, But Upon Life and Right Living. BY RIGHT REV. JAMES E. FREEMAN, D. D., Bishop of Washington. SERVICE—NOT SELF. Bt. John, xv:13—"Greater love hath no man than this, that a man may lay down his life for his friends.” NE day last Summer, at- tracted by a great crowd that was reverently looking down at a space set apart in Westminster Abbey, I saw » tablet that bore the above signifi- cant words. It was the last resting place of England’s unknown soldler. But a few days before I had seen in Paris, under the Arc de Triomphe, a similar grave that represented to France the valiant chivalry of her noble sons. On the heights of Ar- lington, facing the Capital, we have laid away our unknown soldier, and today his tomb has become as a shrine, visited by thousands, month by month. Each of the nations has thus perpetuated its sense of devotion and loyalty to those who in a great world war made the supreme sacrifice. ¥* ok ¥ ok As one stands by the grave of his unknown soldier and reflects upon the cost and sacrifice which war entails he feels an increasing desire to sub- stitute for the arbitrament of arms saner and more Christian methods of eftecting and preserving the world peace. This high resolve does not di- minish our affection for those who in great crises have defended a cause they believed to be just and holy. There are other fields of endeavor than that of the battlefield that call for and demand all that is chivalrous and noble in our natures. There are conditions in our corporate life that urgently demand the best we have to glve. There are flelds of service that call for self-sacrifice and the conse- cration of our finest gifts of head and heart. * ¥k Xk ¥ The graves of our unknown sol- diers, if they are to mean anything to us, must furnish new inspiration to a life of selfless endeavor in behalf of those who in the world’s stern battles have met with misfortune or defeat. We live in a world where problems and difficulties beset us on every hand, and we grow strong and virile only as we seek to solve and over- come them. The great Master of men in one of His finest utterances de- clared that “He that loseth his life shall find it.” Throughout His min- istry His every thought was given to those who'had experienced misfor- tune or disappointment. Every teach- ing that fell from His lips suggested a better way and a higher purpose for life. The highest approximation of love was that a man should lay down his life for his friends. Our whole system of religion, while it recognizes the value of precepts, demands the practical application of these precepts to life itself. A man or a nation never rises to higher dignity or greater power than when in the act of serving others. We cherish the names of such men and women as John Howard and Lady Nightingale. Indeed, the period in which such lives are lived takes on a character that glves it charm and distinction. Our Christian faith, if It means anything, means “service, not selt.” We talk about the persuasive power of the preaching of such men as Beecher and Brooks, but the mightiest power exercised to combat religious indifference and apostasy is a life that spends itself in deeds of service for others. * ¥ k X The heroisms of peace are no less distinguished or worthy than those of wal It may be that some humble mother whose name and deeds are unknown and unheralded is worthier of praise than he who, with the ap- plause of his fellows, proves his fidel- ity and heroism on the field of action. The bread-winner who, in spite of physical weaknesses and burdening cares, carries on, and that without complaint, gets no applause and re- celves no favors—but who will deny him his meed of praise? There are unknown soldiers In our homes and factories, in our classrooms and labo- ratories, men and women, and some- times children of tender age, who are among the foremost of those who are entitled to decorations and honors. The call to service is insistent. There Is no draft measure that can effec- tively press it upon us, but If it be unanswered the world stagnates, character itself loses its finest quali- ties, the noblest virtues we possess are atrophied, and the deeper joys of lite lose their significance. The conquering and irresistible power of Christ resides in His life of ceaseless service. “He went about doing good.” What finer word might be written of Him? “Having loved His own, He loved them unto the end.” Death means nothing to such a one. It is the hour of liberation, the crowning of the victor. There are so many places where service is needed, so many lives that are needy, so many unfrequented paths to real glory, that there is not one among us but may find his task, and, finding it, experience his deepest satisfaction and peace. (Copyright. 192 Cigarettes Displacing Cigars In American BY HARDEN COLFAX. Sixty-nine billion cigarettes in Six billion, seven hundred sand cigars! Such was the tax paid output of American factories last year. The figures are official, having been collected for each month of the year by the Bureau of Inter- naj Revenue and footed up by this cor- respondent to show the grand total for 192 No industry in the United States, with the exception of the new dis- covered radio, shows so marvelous a growth during the past few years as that of the cigarette manufacturer. Nine years ago cigarette production, the official figures show, was some- what less than 18,000,000,000. Manu- facture has increased fourfold with- in the period. But the figures tell another story, too: the passing of the cigar. Four years ago, or during 1920, more than 8,000,000,000 cigars were made and sold over the counter in the United States. Since that time the cigar appears to have declined steadily in favor. Last vear, cigar production ‘was more than 15 per cent below that of 1920. With the single exception of 1915, last year recorded the small- est number of cigars manufactured in this country in 20 years Cigar Is in Retreat. Evidently, the cigarette is rout- ing the cigar in the contest for the smokers’ favor. And here again the figures tell still another story: The extent of the sharp industrial de- pression during the Spring and Summer of 1924. For when business slows down, experience shows, the cigarette industry is among the first to feel the contraction. That is shown clearly by the returns for 1919 and 1920, the one year marking the beginning of our post-war de- pression, the other the height of our industrial activity. As Dbusiness slumped during that perfod, the use of cigarettes decreased more than 10 per cent, the total consumed falling from 53,000,000,000 to 7,000,000,000. Last vear's secondary depression is reflected by a growth of less than 4 per cent in the number of ciga- rettes consumed as compared with 1923 consumption. And in 1923 Smokers’ Favor cigarette consumption was 20 per cent higher than it was in 1922 The | difference between the 20 per cent | of one vear and the 4 per cent of | the next, as manufacturers see it, | represents the gap between a period !of prosperity and one of curtailment. Whatever the correctness of this opinion, the fact remains that the smokers of the United States are to- day supplying Uncle Sam with his third largest item of revenue. Only the income tax and the tariff lead tobacco as producers of funds for the Federal Treasury. In 1924 smokers paid the Government more than $325,000,000 for those little blue rev- enue stamps found on all cigar and cigarette consumption was 20 per cent sum wi'l be even larger—it probably will reach approximately $1.000,000 {for every day of the year. Big Jump in Tax Retarans. Ten years ago, or in 1915, the tax levied by Uncle Sam on smokers was somewhat less than $80,000,000— hardly one-fourth of the sum collect- ed last year. But in 1915 only one- fourth of the number of cigarettes was consumed, as compared with 1924. The widespread use of the cigarette is attributed here to two main fac- tors. The first of these is the in- crease in the number of woman smokers. Nobody here or elsewhere, {80 far as can be found, has anything | tangible by which to measure this in- crease. Everybody knows that more women are smoking today than ever smoked before and that the present large number of woman smokers is growing by leaps and bounds. But if you ask a Treasury official to esti- mate the number of woman smokers he is likely to throw up his hands and admit defeat. They all tell you it can’t be done. The second great factor in running up cigarette consumption to its pres- ent mark of about 1,200 annually for every adult in the country is put down as advertising. Four great to- bacco companies dominate the market, standing as giants above their nu- merous small competitors. And three of those companies have spent mil- lions of dollars cach in advertising the merits of their particular brands of cigarettes. District Obtains Model Law Governing Supply of Milk (Continued from First Page.) for the list. This bulletin was pre- pared monthly, and showed the score for the current and the two preced- tng months. Mnany Scores High. Briefly the way the system worked was that the public, finding that it was receiving a_poor milk from one dairy, could refer to the list and shift to a dealer producing a better quality. The dealer with the poor milk would he forced to find out wherein his milk was below that of the rival concerns and rectify the condition. 1f he had done all in his power in his plant he would be forced to go back to the farmer and Insist on a cleaner supply and a supply richer in fats and other solids. That this system has worked ad- mirably in the past is attested by the various bulletins issued which show some of the dealers scoring well above 90, some rcaching even above 95. As certified milk, that produced under the most exacting conditions and necessarily far more costly scores 99 a milk produced under such conditions as to score 95 is of excellent quality. A tribute is due to the dealers here that they have seen fit to keep up the competition to produce such a good supply. Their efforts have necessi- tated a considerable financial outlay. They could have, no doubt, come to me agreement among themselves, as to what they would and would not do, but instead he majority, through a feeling of pride and rivairy, have probably done about as much as is possible to make the supply pure. Future Is Protected. However, the need of a law requir- ing the tuberculin test was essential, as were the regulations applying to sgections and so on, for some deal- www Bave not been as energetic as they == 7At have been. There has always been the danger that some of the present dealers might go out of busi- ness and new interests might not con- tinue along the policy of quality now pursued. The new law stands as a protection for the future. It removes a possible source of friction between farmer and dealer, for now strictly enforced reg- ulations will be required by law and not by the dealer buying the milk. No ' miraculous change will take place in the milk. It {s excellent now. But over in the office of Dr. Fowler Zood bit of the worry will pass away, for now he and his inspectors will have back of them stringent regula- tions that will remove the danger of any shift in attitude on the part of the producers, either farmer or dealer. e Franco-German United. German officials are unable to con- firm the report of the Petit Parisien Berlin correspondent that Dr. Luther, the chancellor, intends to propose to the French a mutual military guar- antee pact. They state, however, that such a proposal is by no means impossible, and recall that a similar suggestion was made by the Cuno government, but was rejected by M. Poincare on the pretext that the German proposal referred only to the German western front, whereas M. Poincare wanted the eastern or Polish front to be in- cluded in the guarantee. A mutual military pact between France and Germany is a favorite theme of Dr. Stresemann, the foreign minlster. Nothing Constructive. From the Toledo Blade. Many people are so busy telling the world what is wrong with it they haven't time to improve ity THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTO: The Story the Week Has Tol l BY HENRY W. BUNN. HE following is a brief sum- mary of the most important news of the world for the seven days ended February 14: The British Empire.—The British Parllament reassembled on the 10th. A good deal of excitement was caused by the appearance of Miss El- len Wilkinson, Labor M. P., in a flow- ing gown of green taffeta, An earldom is to be bestowed on Field Marshal Lord Allenby in recog- nition of his brilliant performances in the great war and his very valuable services as British high commissioner in_Egypt since the war. Egyptian rule in the territory known as the Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, from the conquest thereof by the re- doubtable Mehemet Ali until the Mah- dist episode (1881-1398), was di gracefully oppressive and Inefficient. That nightmare eplsode of the Mah- di was ended by Kitchener at Om- durman in 1898 and was succeeded (by an agreement between the Brit- ish and Egyptian governments, signed in January, 1899) by the so- called Anglo-Egyptian condominium, which has continued to this day. Nominally the sovereignty |Is equally shared by Great Britain and Egypt, actually it has been exercised by Great Britain alone through the governor general, who by the agree- ment, though nominally appointed by the ruler of Egypt, must have been nominated by the British government. All power is centered in the gover- nor general. The mudirs, or governors of provinces (mudirias), are Britons, and indeed all the important admin- istrative officials are Britons (except for a sprinkling of other Euro- peans), most of them military offi- cers, ‘though the administration is essentially civih. That territory of over a million square miles is adminis- tered by about 110 Britons, and it has been administered with supreme efficiency. The British achievement in Egypt_from 1882 to 1922 (in which last year Britain renounced the protecto- rate) was sufficlently remarkable. Egypt raised from a condition of in- solvency, poverty, insecurity of life and proferty, and oppression of the fellaheen by the most rascally and rapacious set of land holders and offi- clals the world has ever known—raised to a conditlon of complete solvency (treasury bonds at par) and of al most perfect security to life and prop- erty—a condition, too, under which the Egyptian peasantry for the first time in history enjoyed justice, easy well-being and a sense of personal importance, the cultivatable area trebled and the population doubled (from seven to fourteen millions) in consequence of the great British riverine constructions. But it the British achievement in Egypt was remarkable, that in the Sudan has been even more s0. To il- lustrate: Between 1899 and 1309 the revenue yield Increased eightfold, de- spite reduction in taxation, which, in- cidentally, is very light. The increase of presperity thus in- dicated was chiefly accomplished by bringing more land under cultivation through improvement of the water supply, by creation of new industries and by improving means of communi- cation. The railway from Port Sudan to Khartum and thence via Sennar to El Obeid, in Kordofan, has been @ tre- mendous boon. Wrangel Predicts’ Overthrow of Reds Gen. Wrangel, who was recently af “ointed acting “‘commander-in-chief of he Russian army” by the Grand Duxe Nikolal Nikolalevitch, is giving solor to the reports that the mon- archist emigres are planning a cam- paign against the bolsheviks for the present year. In a message to officers, soldiers and sallors who still recog- nize his authority he says: “Away with doubts! The worst Is behind us. The red mist which en- veloped the world is dispersing. The day is near when the red star will set, and the rending of the red veil will disclose the face of national Rus- sia. ®* ®* * The coming year will bring an end to the period of tribula- tion, the Russian regiments will gather under the leadership of the supreme commander-in-chief and the wounded Russian eagle will spread its mighty wing What purported to be details of the belligerent plans of the Nikolaist sec- tion of the Russian monarchists were printed a few days ago in a Munich paper. It was stated that “a fresh Judenitch expedition” was to be set on foot with the help of France, Po- land, Czechoslovakia and the Balkan States, Poland was to be rewarded for her assistance by recelving part of the Ukraine. It was further stated that the White Army was to concen- trate on German soil. the paper quoted is known to be in touch with the circle of the rival Russlan mon- archist leader, the Grand Duke Cyril Vladimirovitch, doubtless the state- ments repeated above come from his supporters. They may, therefore, have aimed only at discrediting Niwo- lai Nikolaievitch by representing him as ready to betray his country to Po- land, detestation of whom is the only bond which at present unites all Russians. Standardizing Big Cranes Is Begun by Makers Experience has proved that from the point of view of simplification there is no essential difference be- tween carpet tacks and 40-ton loco- motive cranes. The crane manufac- turers have found that they have too many types and sizes, for which they are spending good money wastefully, and under the tutelage of the Depart- ment of Commerce they are prepar- ing to get them down to an economi- cal basis. ‘““After dealing with bricks, bottles, blanket: nd similar item: says the report, “the simplification of 35 and 40 ton cranes is much llke petting the elephant after a romp with the canary, but it is apparent that there can be too many varieties of locomo- tive cranes, as well as too many sizes of carpet tacks. “Another project just launched will reflect itself in savings to nearly 16,- 000,000 of our population—that of the proposed simplification and stand- ardization of spark plugs, piston rings and brake linings. The auto- motive industry has long been out- standing in its endeavor to simplify those parts and components which will make for greater economy and accommodation to the vast army of autoists in this country, and yet there has been no stagnation in the design or development of cars since this pol- icy has been followed. “The astonishing thing, however, is the slowness of many lines still 1 ed with duplications and excessive varieties in awakening to the advan- tages and economies which would come from such a general house- cleaning.” 2 Vatican and Argentina. Following the Argentine govern- ment's acceptance of the resignation of the Archbishop of Buenos Aires, it is stated the Argentine government has informed the Holy See that the present nuncio and his secretary are not personae gratie. It is estimated that the population was more than doubled between 1905 and 1921. It is now about 4,000,000. After an inspection of the Sudan in 1909 'Sir Edwin Gorst sald: “I do not suppose that there is any part of the world in which the mass of the popu- lation have fewer unsatisfied wants.” Experts say that with irrigation more than a quartér of the Sudan would be cultivatible. At present only about two and a half million acres are cultivated. The Maharajah of Nepal has an- nounced that slavery in Nepal would be gradually abolished in the near future, the slave owners to be in- demnified. There are now about 50,- 000 slaves and about 16,000 slave owners in Nepal, whereof the total population 1s about five and one-half millions. One-sixth of the world's sheep are in Australia. * % k% The Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovemes.—In the general elec- tions the other day in the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, the bloc, headed by Premier Pachitch, Wwhich favors a unitary system for the kingdom, won a bare majority of seats in the new Parllament. In view of the conditions of the election cam- palgn (the difficultles placed by Pachitch in the way of the opposi- tion) it is doubtful if a majority of the people of the country favor a unitary as against a federal system. Not a single Communist won a seat and the Soclalists lost heavily. * ok kK China.—The Berlin Lokal Anzeiger claims to have dependable informa- tion to the effect that a secret an- nex to the recently signed Russo- Japanese treaty contemplates at the least that China's destiny shall be determined by Japan and Russia in co-operation, to the absolute exclu- sion of all other powers. According to the German newspaper, the most important provisions of the compact are as follows: Should the United States, Great Britain or France undertake military operations against the Peking gov- ernment the latter would have at its disposal 200,000 Russian troops. Japan to assist Russia in making Vliadivostok a first-class naval base and to construct for Russia a num- ber of craft sufficient to make the latter formidable as a naval power. In return, Japan to be conceded full possession of the island Sakhalin, guaranteeing, however, to supply the oil needs of the Russiah Navy. Japanese and Russian officers in equal numbers to train the Chinese Army, of a peace strength of 800,000 men. China to be required to pur- chase from Japan 75 per cent, from Russia 25 per cent of the arms, mu- nitions and equipment required for the Chinese Army. With regard to the above, this writer is a native of Missouri, but the item is interesting and philo- sophic—candor and appreciation of human incorrigibility require recog- nition of the possibility, if not the probability, of its truth. The situation in China is so *“questionable” as to Justify a very generously receptive mental attitude there anent. * ¥k % Leptis Magna.—Excavation now going on under the direction of an Italian archeologist on the site of Leptis Magna is restoring to the D. C. FERRUARY 15 1925—PART light of day, remarkably well pre- served, a large part of that Roman city, abandoned there many Cen- turfes to the desert sands. Leptis Magna was one of three cities which fn Roman times gave the name Tripolis to the narrow strip between sea and mountain and between the two Syrtes (now the Gulf of Sidra and the Gulf of Cabes) on the Medi- terranean coast of Africa. The three citles were founded by the Phoeni- clans before the dawn of history. The most important of them was Oea. The Romans later changed its name to Tripolis and then called the district Tripolitana. The city survives as the modern Tripoli. When in 1911 the Itallans took away from the Turks the great vilayet (regency) of Tripoli (of which the district called Tripolitana by the Romans was a very small part), they changed its name to Tripolitania. In Roman times Tripolitana (the coastal dis- trict, for Roman sway scarcely e: tended beyond the mountalns) was far more fertile than it is at present, but presumably its main importance then, as now, was due to the fact that Oea (Tripolls) was the chief Mediterranean gateway to tffe Sahara, the northern terminus of three great caravan routes, one due south to Lake Chad, one southwest to Timbuktu, one south by east to Wadai and Dar- fur. Leptis Magna (about 60 miles east of Tripolis) shared In this cara- van trade, but commercially was not comparable to Oea (Tripolis), yet from what the excavations are re- vealing, it would seem to have been a far more splendid city. Why? The following explanation seems plaus- ible: Septimius Severus (dled A. D. 211), one of the greatest of the Roman Emperors, was born at Leptis Magna. He is known to have beauti- fled the city. It does not seem im- probable that he completely rebuilt it, “with fortifications, an imperial palace, baths, theater, circus, marble quays, lighthouse, etc., all in a style of great magnificence. That is not very curious. What fs really curious s that so much of Sep- timius Severus' city escaped destruction before the desert engulfed the site. The city was at the very verge of the Roman occupation, was the most exposed of the great Roman settiements to ralds by the nomads, commerce drifted away, the harbor silted up and the city was early abandoned. No doubt the nomads has- tened the evacuation by destroying the plantations thereabout and so giving free scope to the drifting sands. For- tunately for us, all that deserted splen- dor seems to have had little interest for the aboriginal tribesmen, and before the Arabs arrived in the eeventh century and the sand covering was already deep. Forty huge columns that towered above the waste they transported some 80 miles and built into a nesque, but they made no further dispu e with the desert. Prof. Bruno Roselli, back (in the United States) from the site, intimates that the find is at least architecturally more important than Pompeil. Many statues and other fine art objects are being turned up and will furnish the ex- perts much to wrangle about. The Italian governor of Tripolitania is build- ing a good road from Tripoli to Leptis Magna, and if the find is all it's “cracked up to be” the money spent on excavation and restoration will soon be recouped from tourists. No doubt the coastal district once known as Tripolitana is destined to re Debrutalizing Labor BY IDA M. TARBELL. UR Town lives by its fac- tories and mills. We make a great variety of things— structural steel and very proud, indeed, we are of it, for we take the ore fresh from the mines and put it through all its paces up to the time it comes out the skeleton of a car, a bridge, a skyscraper. But we do other things, too, even bottle pickles and knit stockings! For many, many years these have been our tasks. There are men and women in Our Town who can re- member long before such a thing as steel was known in these United States, when our only iron works were little forges where horseshoes, nails and now and then a pair of andirons were hammered out, and when all the pickles and stockings we had were those that the women bottled and knit. That is, you see, we have a history, we have tradi- tions, we have veterans. Why, down in our steel mill there are a couple of men who worked under that greatest leader of steel men, Capt. Billy Jones—worked under him from the day that in 1876 he took charge of Andrew Carnegie’s venture In steel-making at Braddock, Pa. These men will tell you that it was Capt. Jones that made the Carnegle fortune. They labored and struggled under him until the day they saw him" burned to death in a flood of molten metal. * R ¥ % Oh, we have great traditions of men and their struggles, and we are 5o close to it all and have been for 80 many years that we have scant patience with those who come in from outside—who never having lived with mills and factories cannot, so Wwe believe, possibly love and under- stand them. They Bo away to tell the world what intolerable places they are. We never have liked that, though it is true, we have had to admit, that there are many things about us that are quite as terrible as the outsider declared—perhaps even more terrible—things they not know- ing the insides of us thoroughly can- not possibly see any more than they can thoroughly understand what they do_see. We have had to admit that it took an enormous amount of sheer brute labor to do our work: Lifting beyond strength, shoveling materials that filled lungs and head with deadly dust, working in fumes that para- 1yzed, stoking in heat that sent men staggering to the air, felled them in faints. We have known all of that and it h turned us sick at heart that the great industries by which Our Town lived should demand this awful toll of human beings. * X K % It is because we have felt this so deeply—though we have resented outsiders talking about it—that we are so exultant over a change that is coming In our works. It has been coming so long and so gradually that we have hardly realized it, and we have not noticed that our critics generally have seen it, or, if they have they have so disliked to modify their stories that they have kept quiet about it. The truth is that the working places in Our Town are busy de-brutalizing themselves. The other day they asked us dowp to see a new plant started. We had heard about it—they called it a mechanical plant, but that meant nothing until we saw it. And then it meant transformation, revolution, for here there was no man shoveling, lfting, wheeling, stoking beyond his strength, - Thera~ were - tremendous boilers and furnaces in the new plant. They use thousands of tons of coal a week, but from the time that coal leaves the yard in the cars it is not touched by men's hands. Machines controlled by men unload and powder it and blow it into the furnaces. You can walk in front of those roaring fires today in a temperature which never wavers the year round— equable, pleasant, perfectly con- trolled. They have taken away the little hospital in the yard to which they used to carry a half dozen men a day—strong men, prostrated by heat! * ¥ %k Do you wonder that we want to talk about that in Our Town—that ‘we want the outsider to know it? We told this to one outsider, who looked horrified instead of glad. “Don’t you see what they are doing?’ he sald, “displacing labor, taking the bread from men’s mouths—it is but an- other move of capital to impoverish the workingman!"” They certainly have displaced labor. 1 should say where there had been 25 men in the old days there is one now. 1 talked with the superintendent. “Had it nof occurred to you,” he said, contemptuously, “that it took men to make these machines that we are using — trained men, inventors, pattern makers; that it took skilled steel workers to produce them, that it takes at least semi-skilled men to run them. Don’t you see that instead of fewer men employed this plant 'means, if you follow it through to its origin, more men of higher grade employed? Why, if you who live in this town knew as much about these mills as you ought to, you would know that we are halving our un- skilled labor and doubling our semi- skilled and skilled. “Perhaps we did have to do it; I guess we did. The truth is men are pushing up in this country. We can- not get enough of them to do work in the old way and we have to adapt our Industries to men’s ambitions, They want something that pulls on their minds rather than their mus- cles. It is brains that is making steel now, not brawn.” I talked to others about it. There ‘was & smelter. “Yes, it is true,” he said. “Down in Arizona we have bullt a mechanical plant that with 240 men is doing the work which in our old-time plants required 1,400. | We had to do it, we could not get un- skilled men enough.” * % X % What I had seen and what I was hearing made me think about some- thing I saw two or three years ago in southern Idaho. In the center of thousands of acres of redeemed sage- brush land a great electrio plant, through which the impounded waters of the Snake River dam were dis- tributed to farms as they were need- ed, and one woman, one lofie woman, was running the whole thing—in the absence of her husband, who was the official engineer. Her eye on the dials, her quick hand on the levers turned waters on and off through all the big territory as tite telephone told her they were required. There were hardly enough men in Idaho 20 years ago to have done that work as efficiently as that plant, run by one woman, was doing it at that moment. As we talked it over we agreed that it explained many things in Our Town. It explained something that the women had been noting—that there were many more eligible young men in town for our girls who had been to business schools or college. They were men, and vet they were college men, engineers, chemists, trained men. Wo had not asked how * it could be that the.type of ths mem cover, through Italian efforts of reclama- tion, much of ite ancient agricultural importance. * k %X ¥ The United States of America.— On February 11 the Senate ratified, with certaln reservations, our com- mercial treaty with Germany. On February 11 the President sign- ed the naval appropriation bill with its amendment requesting him to summon a disarmament conference. The congressional inquiry into aviation . conditions and policles, wherein Brig. Gen. William Mitchell, assistant chief of the Army Air Service, has been the central figure, is of great Interest and importance, but too controversial and complicated for detailed notice here. The Presi- dent has sent to the House a message calling for a supplemental appropria- tion of $17,000,000, under the fiscal year 1925, for completion of work on certain airplane carriers and con- struction of new naval airplanes, and for a supplemental appropriation of $13,000,000, under the fiscal year 1926, for modernization of six battleships and construction of eight crulsers and six gunboats. It is reported that Dr. Leonard of Johns Hopkins, in collaboration with Dr. Johnson of Yale, has developed a most wonderful antiseptic. According to the report, it is far more powerful than carbolic acld, yet may be taken internally without harm to the taker, but with lethal effects to diseass germs in the kidneys or urinary tract. Nicholas John, king of the Romanies or Gypsies of the United States, died at Waterbury, Conn., the other day. At his funeral coins were dropped in his coffin, wherewith to pay Charon for his ferriage across the Styx. A new king has been chosen. ‘There were 16 lynchings In the United States in 1924, the smallest years number of recofd. There were 33 in 1923, ke Gt Miscellaneous.—The Belgian Parlia- ment 1s soon to be dissolved owing to a deadlock over the question of wom- an suffrage. The French forces In the French protectorate of Morocco are being re- inforced. The situation grows ever blacker for Spaln in the Spanish zone of Morocco. On the other hand, there is a persistent report that Abd El Krim, the Rifflan chief is dead. If true, Spain has great occasion for thanks. It is reported that Gen. Ludendorft has resigned the leadership of the German Fascisti and has ceased to attend the sessions of the Reichstag. Dr. Marx, the other day chancellor of the German Reich, is now chancel- lor of Prussia. Unemployed to the number of 190,- 000 are receiving doles in Austria. The Greek government has appeal- ed to the League of Nations in the matter of the expulsion of the Ecu- mencial patriarch from Constan- tinople. Wahhabite troops have occupled Jidda, the seaport of Mecca. The Sultan of Nejd has now gone far to complete the conquest of the entire Arabian peninsula, except for certain coastal districts in the posses- sion of or under the protectorate of Great Britain. More fighting reported from Libya, Italian troops; assisted by friendly tribesmen, thrashing _recalcitrant tribesmen. Not a big thing but in- teresting. Seeks Standard Form For Farm Surveys Experience having proved that many efforts to cure the ills of agriculture g0 wrong because no one knows what ills are to be cured, the agricultural bureau of the Chamber of Commerce of the United States is preparing a standard form of agricultural survey which is to serve the purpose of what the doctors would call systematic diagnosis. Many commercial organizations throughout the country are trying to harness up with agriculture, within their trade areas. Some succeed ad- mirably, but others fail because they have not discovered what is the mat- ter with agriculture in their section. Crop rotation and calf glubs will not remedy a condition due to a tax sys- tem which discourages the landowner and encourages tenant farming. Nor will it compensate for a defective marketing system. The agricultural bureau of the na- tional chamber believes that, how- ever commendable these hit-or-miss efforts might be, much more can be accomplished by laying bare the flls of agriculture in any trade area first and then devising a remedy. The work of formulating a standard form of survey which will accomplish this purpose is now under way and will soon be avallable to commercial or- ganizations interested in agricultural improvement. Youths Able to Dance Paid Highly in Paris More than 30 young men in Paris are earning $5,000 a year by acting as professional dancing partners in the cabarets, says the New York Her- ald (Paris edition). Two years ago & young Englishman arrtved from London with nothing but a suit of evening clothes and a pair of nimble feet. Last year his earnings were more than $15,000. The fees which women pay vary from $2.50 to $50, but some profes- slonal dancers have received as much as $200 for a single dance. ‘The record is held by a South Amer- ican woman, who paid $750 for one dance. — in the mills had so changed; we wers only thankful that it was so. And it explains something else—the pres- sure that the boys of the town are making for books to read, technical schools to go to. They are seeing what we had not realized, that they must know more than their fathers did it they are to make good in the steel mill. They must know some- thing of mechanics, of electricity, of mathematics. * K ok So we are glad in Our Town. It is a long step, so we feel, away from those things that have tormented us, though we took good care not to let the investigating outsider ses our trouble. We thought it could not be helped. Shoveling coal, for instance, has always seemed to us one of the ugly, unescapable facts of the uni- verse. It had to bs done, always would have to be done, somebody must do it, and somehow we felt as if God in His eternal wisdom had cre- ated a class fit only to do that; that is, we argued as the old slaveholder did, that the negro was created for the expre purpose of working in cotton and sugar cane flelds, and that to free him was to fly in the face of his Creator. Of course we never put it baldly like that, but we explained to our- selves the ugly facts we did not like in some such way. And now we find that the greatest of steel and iron men are telling us that they cannot afford men to shovel coal. Well, if it can be done away with here, can it not be done away with in other places? Will it not have to be done away with everywhere in time? It certainly has come to be true in Our Town that we cannot af- ford to use.men in brutal tasks, that we are our labor. nm) Howe About The Nature of -Woman; Bank Robbers and Borrowers; Oppressors of the Poor. BY E. W. HOWE, “The Sage of Potato Hill.” S I become older, I think I be- come meaner. Certainly you remember a character in fic- tion called Old Scrooge, sup- posed to be a villain. Well, I like him, and think very little of Tiny Tim, a famous boy angel. I dislike the Christmas story in which these two appear. I dislike that other famous story in which the writer de- clares: “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.” * % ¥ *x 1 read the other day of the death of a bachelor, and when his will was opened, mearly all his kind received bequests. It isn't that way in our family: when one of our kin dies the rest of us are assessed. * % % * What Is the most perfect method of wasting time? I believe it is reading the average “love” Story. * % X * I suppose white and black women are more or less alike. Therefore the habits of old Hannah, the black woman who works for us, interest me. I have noticed that when the milk tickets are exhausted, she calls my attention to the fact with a sort of glee: she-likes to see me spend my money. She evidently thinks all men part with their money reluctantly, and enjoys seeing my misery. A new milk ticket costs $2; a new icebook costs $5 1 always note old Han- nah enjoys the icebook incident much more than she does the two-dollar item. * ok k¥ Lately bankers are organizing to defeat those bold men who appear with pistols and demand that all money in sight be shoved Into sacks. But have bankers organized to de- feat those men who borrow money and never pay it back? Money loaned to unsafe borrowers is as completely lost as money carried off by burglars. * ¥ X ¥ Unusual thing seen in reading: “The daily and hourly progress of madness and folly and wickedness will at least make a fine narrative in history.” But probably the people of the future will have so many follies of their own that they will not care greatly for ours in 2025. * Kk ¥ ¥ I credit William Allen White with one of the wisest and wittiest say- ings of recent years, and I happen to be the subject of it. The sentence that seems to me to be unusual is this: “Ed Howe refuses to' love his neighbor as himself because he knows the truth about himself and suspects the same truth about his neighbor.” I wish I had thought of that first; it aptly states the fact. But I have “All men are liars, and I am no more certain about myself than I am about you. Continuing, Mr. White says: “He has done more good, under protest that he was doing evil, and deserved more credit, than any other man In. the. country, When he goes to Heaven there will be a big row at the gate; he will be met thera by & long list of his misdeeds which he has lied about; he never did thems He is so dead set on proving there is no nobility in the world that he has kidded himself into a belief in his own meanness. St. Peter wiit have to vell at Ed, and will have to call in the neighbors to prove that old Ed Howe was not the kind of man he pretended to be; instead of which he was much better.” I do not know where the notion® comes from that I have contended there is no nobility in the world. & sincerely believe in much more tham most others. The trouble probably is I contend the good in the world Is found among the common people, and not among the professional good gentlemen. My offending seems to be that & contend it is better in every way to, honestly estimate myself, the peopls and the world than it is to make a lot of foolish pretenses. I have never knowingly opposed any honest reform, or written slightingly of a really good man or woman. The sub- Ject of my tiresome preaching is the® importance of charity, usefulness, true progress, kindness, efficiency;, fairness, temperance. But when men make these things protessional as an excuse for taxing: the poor I look upon such profes- sionalism as cruel and damaging to the real goodness which is a natural, part of human life. Further along Mr. White says ofe me: “To get an oppressor of the poor to dine at his board gives Ed more’ joy than to take a city.” “Oppressors of the poor” is a term» he uses in his literary work, and, frequently it Is used to designate_ very worthy men. Probably John D. Rockefeller, the most useful man the world has ever known, is the chiet of those Mr. White refers to as “op- pressors of the poor.” 3 My connection with Mr. Rockefeller is this: I once wrote an appreciatior of the good the man has accom-: plished. I did not send him marked copy, or endeavor in any other way to call his attention to it. But somehow he saw it and wrote me a letter. This is the extent ofe our acquaintanc : No oppressor of the poor has dined at my board, and I have no more’ ambition to find such a guest than 1) have to take a city. said it in another way. I once wrote: (Copyright, 1925.) Britain Parallels America In League of (Continued from First Page.) mosphere is one of profound calm. All suspicion of even hostility to France, which was 80 marked one year and three years ago when I was here, has disappeared, from the sur- face at least. Such irritation as ex- sts is directed at Germany, not so much because of German wickedness as what fs regarded as German stu- pidity. What British statesmanship is afrald of is that German policy will blunder and force the hand of the British rulers, who are all for temporizing and gradually solving the ~ difficult problems, which are mainly difficult because of their ex- treme complexity % Note that British statesmanship is enormously concerned in preventing any “incident” in Europe at the mo- ment, whether a French or German “incident.” It is struggling with the problem of giving France an frre- ducfble minimum of security by guarantee without offending Germany or permitting a guarantee to take on the character of a separate, there- fore anti-German, alliance. It Is equally concerned with finding a way to modify the more sweeping provi- sions of the protocol, so far as Brit- ain is concerned, without injuring the prestige of the league or arous- ing continental resentment, er—this is an obvious danger—seemmg to in- timate to Germany that she has Brit- ish assent to a policy of aggression in eastern Europe, provided she will “b8 good” in the west. After all, this is precisely the saituation in which the genius of the British race shows itself at its best. The quali- ties which are demanded are not only those which Britons have always dis- played to a greater extent than any other people, but they are qualities which are, on the whole, unmistak- able assets in the present Baldwin cabinet. Today I think one may assume that every nation in Europe, every people, at least desire peace, but the experi- ences of war have been for all con- tinental peoples so terrible that peace has left them with a tremen- dously exaggerated if wholly natural and comprehensible conception of thelr own necessities in the way of national and international assurance and insurance. Peace changed some relations, but it intensified rather than reduced tra- dition and racial and national appre- hensions, Britain’s Calm View. The British, on the other hand, by reason of their relative isolation, are in a position to take a far calmer view of realities. Moreover, since thelr isolation is only relative, they are bound to be involved in any new struggle. They have a passion for peace which is uncolored by any na- tional conviction that peace is at- tainable, save at the price of meas- ures which are in themselves calcu- lated to abolish the possibility of en- during peace. One must point out in all fairness that the danger for the British lies precisely in the possibil- ity that this relative isolation may lead to the adoption of policies which shall seem to the nations feeling themselves endangered as selfish and simply ealculating. In that case the advantage of the British position would be lost, British statesmen would promptly encounter precisely the continental coalition ~ which wrecked the Genoa conference. That is why a mere rejection of the pro- tocol would be, to use the term cribed to Chamberlain, nothing than “fatal” Alsé British influence would be de- stroyed, British policy compromised, if Germany should in the end take an intransigeant ‘attitude and adopt blustering methods. Then reluctant- 1y, certainly, but Ineluctably, I be- lieve, the British would be driven back to a real alllance with France. For one thing that every American must realize is that at the bottom of his heart every Englishman knows now, after the last war, that he is a Euro- pean; that his Immunity is a thing of the past: that for him there is no peace unless there is peace in Hu- rope. If he fails in his endeavor to promote peace, then he must face the practical problem of what side to take in any new struggle. That he would decide for France still T think remains inevitable, at least provided At were the Fsamud 88 Herriot facing let Nations Debate the Germany of resurgent junkerdom.” To end this brief summary of pre: ent British political optnions, I think I should add that for the first time in all my British visits, during the peace conference and since, there is a” pretty general acceptance of the< view that the United States is defi-, nitely out of the league. This con- viction has been expressed to me lately by some of the most ardent friends of the league, champions of. American participation. One cannot disguise the fact that ac- companying this conclusion is the feeling that the present British sit- uation is largely a result of Amer: can defection; that, in a certain sense, by refusing to co-operate with*® Britain we have driven her back intoc Europe with not attractive conse-: quences. Naturally, as a consequencs, of this fact, debt settlement with America is less popular in London than at any moment since the war. L: do not mean by that to say that the Anierican is badly treated; that he” suffers any form of discomfort or of” inconvenience; that would be ab-: surdly Inexact. There is only a rather. subtle sense that one is regarded rather as a foreigner than as a rela’? tive in-a land where for many years people have been accustomed to dif- ferentiate between Americans and foreigners. Yet one should imme~ diately qualify by saying that we re- main the best treated of visiting for-t elgners. After all, too, thé position” We occupy is that which we have de- liberately chosen. (Copyright, 1925.) 2 Rhodesian Skull i Believed New Type: The skull which was found among the prehistoric human remains at’ Broken Hill, Rhodesia, in 1921, and is- believed to be the oldest in existence, is that of a type of man unknown be- fore. This statement was made by Prof. Sir Arthur Keith, conservator of thes Royal College of Surgeons’ Museum,. in a lecture at the College of Sur- geons in London. " “It is” he said, “one of the mosti important discoveries of anclent man ever made, because we cannot fit him in with any kind of man with which we are familiar. & “He is an absolutely new type to. us—a type of man that we had no. idea of before. He is a man of ex- (reme}y primitive type, so primitive, so unlike other races living, that we have to create a new specles for him.”, He estimated that this man lived. anywhers between 100,000 and 200,000 years agn. He added: “The bones found show that this man could walk in an up. right position and was 5 feet 9 inches, or a little more in height. “Although the skull has,strong ra-’ semblances to the gorflla, this man’ was not 5o very low down in the scals 83, egards brain, being even higher some of the low beings alive today.r > Of human Socialist Bakery Fails, - _The Austrisn Soclal Democrats, 15 years ago, founded the Hamme: Bakery in Vienna, to destroy what® they called the “capltalist monopoly't: of bread production, now see them, selves compelled to sell the establish.” ment, being unable to compete wItH™ capitalism any longer. This bakery was exclusively owned by the Soclal: ist’ party until after the ‘war, when' 40 per cent of the shares were sold" to Herr Bosel to repay debts to Dutch bankers. Numbered Phone Girls. “ - Telephone subscribers in Paris, who, have formed an association to pro. tect their Interests, have suggeste to the administration that the girl’ who answers a subscriber's call should mention her number when re- plylng. Instead of the usual “I am listening,” it is suggested that the” formula should be *No. —-is listen ing.” This would help the subseriber in the event of a complaint being, necessary. g 4