Evening Star Newspaper, February 14, 1926, Page 81

THE SUNDAY STAR, WASHINGTON, D. C., FEBRUARY 14, 1926—PART 5. ] Comics of the Season and Live Topics From Florida and Italy Valentine Day Brings Out Difference In Sense of Humor, Even in the Family said, beneath the bough once is th two Russian Novels in hand.” uinly come home and , thats my around this time last year when talk- ng about Valen tangled wildwoods lectual rea i came ne Up through ¢ strip about \ ines in t care d. and Toved over he says, t doft to me ikl the o A \ding nd all valen ot only t like r them old d. then The e old-style it to ain a tern wh After T had bo about hol teacher mine, 1 to stand the who! the follering espe didn't find out done ) Why g s Ain’t vou ashamed t s such a thing! valen nd ser T we it nd a Ha! ember that, too West the wind b listen says, T bit fun would to send Some. Now lere don't that wi ny, Hot B 1 how you like it omebody was You a Valent that, hu thing to the effec 1 think Tt makes me cough and sne You make me vou are You're a hunk of cheese!™ Tiuh Ud lay one off or her, on no such th The only gets burt b hirds witho stek m the 1 about our mental daily dozen which we resolved the first of last mo. to do? Shall I drag out the intellectual-tonic and get busy? And, right, I am glve a groan and savs all and 1 no. not shoot, gonner t at merciful This case of reading au serious book. you know. In this of self-education which we agreed to take up, we have now come, dear. to the great Russ and T _am about to descend on you with a Vol of Count Ten, better known as Rum- pleupski. Perhaps I had better com- mence at the beginning. and read you hort life of him in the front of course vs Geo. alentines right out and, but T thouzht had a long life? comic and other of his head und you said this felle He did, for 4 Russian, I come bz at him, but there is a short life of him here, just the same. All right, 8ays Geo., zo ahead let's e the long and short of it! he settled down for a good nup and I commenced to read aloud So the | minded, we sdn't | putting | to I husband, led us into the of up-to-date intel- notic- | | “FINALLY, KATINKA G T UP. SLOWLY, AND FETCHED THE MEAT-AXE FROM BEUHIND THE STOVE™ Count Ten, or, as his fellow jail birds of gay Siberian days loved (o call him, Rumpleupski, was Lorn on the date of his birth in a biz storm | near Lipstick, in Northern Cremoni. His mother was present at the time, | | and remarked. when they told her| | that had it heen twins one would | been a “Popovar paviova, | chicowski,” meaning in her na alf’s tongue. “The hoy will never 4 maker of holes in Swiss cheese This remarkable predi true, for 171, vears late | imprisonment at Vodka « |account of the Emperor, because of his publication of the now famous *1 { Won't! pamphlet, Rumpleupski was | ved, while thus {ncarcerated, | cheese-puncher, but in the | 1 discarding of loose holes such as the peas. d to wear. These but came into_evidence in e reader will doubtfu as a protest azainst the ap ith the dentists and the ration of much native vell hotels of the world. fon came | iring his the charge | remember. pointments consequent m | caviar to the ‘Rl MPLEUPSKI was largely re i sponsible for many important movements in Russia, having a mov- | | ing van business of his own in Mud | dier and. later. in Wetter. In fact he ws derably the van, no Tvan pidor, in’ his savs to the ¢ e one of the most iy ; least known of Ru famous au thors dying prac alone, desert- |ed even by his enemies, and left to | turn his frozen fuce towird his favor- fte ice box, the only thing left him | at the last. From this the accompany- | ing mms. was gathered, handled with | | tongs after his death. But, as he him- | ve put it, “Ischkabibble!" | g | pause and so did € | he says. It hits 1 hard, knocks for a goul, in fact Will that do for lonight, or do we get | it over with? W I says, let's see | how the story He we | It's called “Sour Blood, Or the | Yeast Cake Well, this book v a person 1 1 cheery, even from ! the start, w h run, or rather cr | off, about to the following effect | | Ivor lived in a damp and filthy | cellar on a “Sinkovich” in Moscow?® | (*Translator's Note: Sinkovich., a sort of back alley.) Despite his utter- most _efforts to pull himself out of | this condition, lie could not seem to do so, although his bootstraps were almost worn out from the tremendous efforts which he had made to pull himself up by them. He would sit by the hour amidst the muck of the lowest step of the wretched stairs Lost 't exactly what in which led down into his dreary abode, sucking tea, muttering to himself (in French, which he had learned while summering in Alaska as a relief from the severe Siberian Winter climate), and cursing the fate that kept him ground into the dust, which, when it wasn't dust, was mud. A the years went by grew weaker and weuker, Ivor had not been able to ele self in the world by much single step up the rickety flight whic led upward and outward toward the sunlight and sleighbells His boots themselves and still e him had become %0 feeble from the constant strain of | the pulling straps, that the leather gave forth only squeaking sound when Ivor tu 4 sound that reminded him of vou wolves king nourishment in dark forests of Pineville, which had bheen his home, ng ago before he accidentally fallen manhole. into this strange sort of life from which there was no escape * % % now PRESENTLY Katinka came and sat | beside him on the lowest step. Where she had come from after all these vears he did not know. A lightweight stlence fell upon him. Then # medium weight silence Then, while she still sat and sat still vy silence fell, h v that hed nd his ears. So he re ined lent, for about a week and 1 half. Finally Katinka g ow- Iy, and fetched the wtaxe from behind the stove of delicate porcelain. With this she broke the long silence “Why do you sit here in silence and the cellar, Ivor?” she asked. “It is my fate!” The words were not spoken, he was beyond that: the sentiment was merely indicated by a convulsive twitching of the left eye- brow. But Katinka, being almost a woman by now, understood, all too plainly. She gave, or rather loaned 1 shriek, sharper than the meat-axe which she twirled her delicate finkers. “It is not fate, it is those boots!"” she 1d stolidly ““They are sun deep in the mud of this underworld “It has ever been so with our peo- ple.” Ivor managed to masticate the words at last. “The case Is hopeless.” said she, in that deep, gut- tering voice of hers “Why not re move the boots, let them remain in the muck, and climb the steps in stockinged.feet, if that is necessary.” He scowled. “My mother my would never give her said. *“And vet, it is p will never know, although it will be three years come Michaelmas since she took her life-extension course! Come, let us be brave!” He withdrew his feet with a swift gesture. mother, ‘tion,” he e that she the bootstraps | a weak, | through | it | nervously among | { appropriat t 1 ging “Ni nil"* (Translator'’s note | Vulgar-Boatman Song.) wly Into the light, | behind forever. Forever | quite, for to Tvor's left thumb | give | 1am the fle tehi nitchi The Famous they climbed And But not he wis when | dnly 1s says, say George to tell me you v had got r, that cert strone tlot Bozo! I Jules, you mean understand what it is all about? I certainly do, he says indignant, what makes you think I am o dumb, of course T got it, for the luvva tripe! Then explain it to me, I says, I'll bite, where's the he there must be one in it someplice? ive 1 « pitving but n o | Say. he e dning hook it tellige look to you when you on v 1t don't { you had at all, would reading 11 —it’s too deep for you all full of symbulism! Yeh, Savs, with the wceent on the bul But Geo. wouldn't admit it was all as clear as mud to him. e went to bed In a huff, and [ went into a ha! ha! Well, down to wonld T sell unde s . gh to get of done so While too I when 1 shoppir where iy ve valen S there was ¢ . the svebrows unny feet, a big book propped open his weak knees, and a verse that a perfect scream. You think vou're & highbrow and know about hooke. it to know something, you're ooks you talk the day he next villa the pen went what hey and in store schoolboc only ete brne Latin and make a al. and so couldn't help but send it think them comics are only b | when they ain’t appropriate or any- thing, see, and this certainly was So the next morning Geo. got it, and instead of laughing it off, like I had expected from t he d said. why he w: as pup, so 1 merely says why no. 't imagine dear, who sent it see, ‘especially as Geo. had sent me the loveliest card with o my only Valentine, My Darling Wife” on it. I was tickled to death with it, too, until I remembered what he had sald about sending only comics, and then I commenced to wonder. After all, men’s sense of humor is very queer, I ca especially husbands. (Copyright. 1926 ) When Ii’s a Case of Getting Things D(;ne, Which Nation Has a Dictator to Rule? BY SAM HELLMAN. HAT'S all this hollering e\ > read about this lad Mussolini?" 1 a High Dome Finne- gaan. ~“Who's hollering?” he comes back I see, y: where they're hold- ing meetings over here. bawling the spaghetti out of him for running the country all by himself, bumping off every bobo that won't play ball with him and shutting up all the news- papers that don’t give three cheers avery time he opens his trap.” ‘Well,” remark: High Dome,” “they seem to be satisfied with him in Ital “How do you know they are?” 1 de mands. T understand that “He's on the job. ain't he?” cuts in Finnegan. “Of course. there ar lot of blokes that are raising hek with him, but ain't the ‘outs’ in every countty always trying to hang the razberry on the ‘ins “From what I hears down in Tony Bugoni's chianti dump,” says I, “Mus- solini’s just putting the country on the “Maybe he returns “High “but the fact remains that in’t hardly anybody out of work in Italy, and they're coming back from the war faster than any other How do you laugh “This ain't my laugh day minds him, “but T thought we went to war to make the world safe for de- mocracy.” “What of it?” demands Finnegan. “What kind of democracy do you call it,” 1 asks, “when a bim takes hold of & country, gives Congress the * snow and ice and sends evervbody that criticizes him to jail or the here- after?” “A good one, “High Dome.” 1deas, the only wa is to have a dictato! “What's the matte: tlo, “with the way this country run “Not a thing,” says Finnegan, pt, “and it's because we got a or.” “President Coolidge a dictator!” I axclaims. “Coolidge or another comes back “Hizh Dome.” “There never w: a dictator like the United States rigsed np for itself in the Con- stitution, and that’s why we get along so grand.” “How do you figure the President runs things all by himself?” I in- quires, puzaled. ‘““What about Conr gress? What about the courts?™ I'd say,” returns “According to my / to run a country I asks, sarcas- is President,” DON'T GIVE A HOOT.” “Don’t be so simple,” snaps Finne gan. “Any President with brains can | make Congress do anything he Wants. He—" “He can’t send 'em to jail or kick ‘em_out of their jobs, can he?" T asks. “Maybe not,” replies “High Dome, “but there’s more ways of strangling & goat than by choking him to death with hors d'ceuvres. All the Presi- dent's got to do is club 'em into line.” “Club 'em?” I exclaims. “What with?" “Patronage.” says Finnegan. “The ‘way politics is run around here a Con gressman is got to show a few new post offices and some johs in his dis- if wants 10 be elected aga'u, 1 admits. “Well,” goes on “High Dome,” “‘the President passes out the jobs, and he also has & dog named Veto he turns loose on you every time you yefuse t@ A “AS LONG AS NOBODY SWIPES HIS PROPERTY AND INTER- FERES WITH HIS COUPON CLIPPING THE AVERAGE AMERICAN play in his back yard. The President maybe can’t put a Congressman in jail for bucking against the traces, but he can send him up Salt River by turning down his thumbs on every- thing he wants for his constituents.” “What's Salt River”” I inquires. “The place where lame ducks go,” explains Finnegan, “when they die politically. If you can remember as far back as Roosevelt you'll recall that he got what he wanted. There was a dictator for you. “Perha 1 azrees, “but Coolldge me kind of a go-getter.” returns “High Dome.” ng. He don’t make as <e about it as Teddy did, but he gets what he wants just the same. You notice he hasn't” been turned down on anything that he really wanted. “3 don’t sea wheve having infinonce on Congress makes a man a dictator,” ‘Remember, feller,” comes back Fin- negan, “the President of the United States also appoint Supreme Court, and is also mander in chief of the Arr Navy. Do you know any ather coun try where one man has ail of those strings in his hands? In Italy even Mussolini would still have to go to the King to get some things done. The United States is the only country that has a real dictator.” “It don't seem like he's a dictator,” com plains place, we've never sent anvbody to the ‘White House who's gone cuckoo. All of our Presidents, no matter what mistakes they've made, huve heen de- cent, brainy men, with no idea of get ting rich at the job or turning it over to their children. In the second place, not one person out of a hun- dred in the United States knows any- thing about the Government or the way it’s run. As long as nobody swipes his property and interferes with his coupon clipping, the average American don’t give a hoot what goes on at Washington. He Woesn’t know whether there's a dictator there or not, and doesn't care any more than I do about the price of saucepans in Peru. Do you realize what a Presi- dent of the United States could do if he decided to be real rough?”’ “Have a cabaret and a Charleston contest on the White House lawn?” I suggests. “He could call out the Army and Navy,” says Finnegan, “and start a war tomorrow with Mexico or Canada, let's say."” “Without asking Congress?” I wants to know. “You're crazy “It takes Congress to declure war,” admits “High Dome,” “but Congress hasn’t_anything to do with starting one. Under the Constitution the Presi- dent is the boss of the Army and Navy, and not Congress. If he should order the Army to jump over the Canadian line and bombard Toronto they’d have to do it. That'd start a war, wouldn’t 1t?” ‘The Army wouldn’t obey!” says I. “If they didn't,” returns “High Dome,” “they’'d be guilty of mutiny. However, don’t worry. The President ain’t gonna start no wars. 1 just men- tioned that example to show you how much power there was in the White House. The King of sland couldn’t start a war. The President of France couldn’t. Neither could the Prime Ministers of those places.” *The guya that, framed the Constiter cing the boots | imbedded in | that's | 4 in the head from the front | honest, 1| a taste | T hadder do this, | the judges of the | and | | BY STEPHEN LEACOCK. HERE seems to be a very gen eral feeling all over this con tinent that the present year is | going to witness a great re | duction in taxes | They say that in the United States | the natlonal budget will be cut down | by three billion—or by half a million | —“some such big sum as that. In Can ada the annual taxes will be reduced to thirty-five dollars per head; either | thut or three hundred and fifty dollars. In Mexico there are to be no taxes at all except for the very poor. And even the Fskimd are cutting down this s by two pounds of biub her per iglo But there question as to who are the pe are to ot the benefit of the reduc Whose taxes are to be cut first? In order to help in solving th lem | have heen getting together special Information. T have picked it up in conversation with some of the peop with whom I sociate from day to day and in reading pe views in the newspapers. | don it is mplete. But it looks good far If any government officials care (o it they v have it without cha MR GRUNCH INCOME t ilustrat news of friemd M fax vietim, dinner over ON TAX THE As a fiv me give the irunch, super as imparted 10 me bis own private T shouldn’t want to complain about the high taxes—I mean, in any way that would reach the out stde-—reach it. that is, in_connection | with my name. Though I think the | thing ought to be said by somebody. | I think vou might say it. (Let me pour you out another glass of this Conquistador: yes, it's the old 'S7; | but T suppose well nev et any of it on this side; they say that the rich Spaninrds are making so | much money thev're buving up every cask of it and it will never be exported | in) Vut at all as | w " g, 1 think not me, w ubout the inc the whole country men with {ncomes— he- | hind vou. Tdon't suppose they'd want | vou to umention their names | thev'd he behind vou, see? (Wil [ try one of these Googonlias? Th. | tha very best. hut I guess we'll never | them azain.) s vaise @ cor | tax you'd find | all the and that will he S if @ man sticks | HeRttolt and earning all the neome he can his bit, in g b the countr o way hind he' he's CUTTING INTO THE BARBER But compare with all that the views of my barher as scraped into “SAY DO YOU THINK THE BARBER BUSINESS IS A 1.1 XURY?” me with his or in the course of a lelsurely after-breakfast shave. “T am not saying Govermment (any factsl massage this morn; I guess they know their < or they'd ought to, any: But when they talk of cutting down these here taxes, why don’t they h cutting off this here muni- license tax on the barber busi- (Will I singe them ends a » other d: the wh paper t £a1d ths was 2 luxury anc xed pretty hard on ) vou it's a luxur “As I see it, the barber business is the most necessary business in the whole country. A man’ll without everything Just he can't get along without a can he? not without losing all the pep and self-respect that kee him & 1 & ought to of had cr T don't kick, I just dit for word about the | get along | about, | “If a man appreciates what 1 do, and likes to pay a little extra for it, why, so much the better, but if he's low ‘enough to get out of this chair re in and walk off without giving nt more than he has to, why let him go. 1 it comes to taxing the barber business—well, 1 say it's the ke the country ever TAKE TAX OFF A somew gifferent patriotic to me by m me for my new pr “Compladr line of busin Mr. Fephso become us to co; Mr. Fephson) haps, it is rathe Government (3 these heavy t 1t encourage ich we fe O t PANTS. but eq our ever 2 rdly . pockets k, per- » for the the lex) to keep y imported mate. in fuller in the chest, ng more w the ade up i 500 meml vention four-day _ sittir “We feel it to be (2S) very appro- s, | priate. | proper tax | week after next | our ne Investigator Finds Really Nothing Left But the Dog Tax to Support Government Our feeling is that a gentle- man wearing one of our new worsteds under one of our brotherhood light overcoats (Mr. Fephson, please show the brotherhood 1i oating) is really doing a Y “In_short, that the would be to re move the duty off all apparel alto- gether (anything in an extra pant- ing with the suit? The If we can, sir; we rushed at present with rotherhood orders. Good po are greatly morning, < OUR LITTLE O FUN? A to th Pav d ussion « of viewer last cini, the celel | I would not | Rouvermer be w hein Missourt an kind of Er tour with “But, 1 leetle stinet eontrit wred want t tecize ze would tree nes fro; any m and nen dor S war! Me for t magnifique endeede, hein? ht vear me o1 the trench —what ¥ | | has got {any sales tax mistake, killin on capital | destrovs ine ¥ tax on t to & | a | every won't i for i t bear and the po In short there’s nothing dog tax. T can see i 1 but the £ht BY RING LARDNER. O the editor: No doubt my lit- tle radlo audience would like ar a few incidence in re- is to my little trip from Jacksonville to Belleair down lin Florida. It is about time people | was hearing about Florida which has [ been kept a kind of a secret in the newspapers for some reason another. Personally nobody has approached me |in the matter and I am at liberty to | disgust the subject without fears and ¥ so will start out with a brief | iption of the little trip referred { w a good many folks in making this trip take a shot of morphine be: fore climbing into their birth and thereby miss a good many incidence of the trip. 1 went to bed, as they laughingly call it, with a clear mind and well able to appreciate all that went on. @ Well, the time table says we was to pull out of Jacksonville at 10 p.m. 50 along about midnight the engineer showed up at the information desk at the union station and inquired as to the probable whereabouts of his mount. Nobody seemed to know till | finely a little colored boy (they call | 5 | & vors | them pickaninnies down there) hap- pened to make the remark that he | had seen a train on Track 7 that look- | d kind of lonesome and sure enough it turned out to be the one sought. The firemen had also found it some way and was chuckling to himself over a copy of “Wit of the World” when the engineer appeared. “Well, Bill” said the “what's the good word?" Never better,” was the reply. “The week’s record is 8 hours late and It's raining so it looks like we ought to beat it without no difficulty. But the | Pullman_conductor told me they was |a few of the passengers asleep and that will half to be rectified before we t gor ’* “All fireman, zht. but wait till T read you this one.” ‘Johnny.' said the teacher, ‘how do you spell frog? ‘Frog, sald Johnny. ‘Good!" said the teacher. ‘Good!” sald Johnny. ‘It’s perfect “T got a boy like that,” said the en- when the laughter had died “Well, let's go!” But when Referee Crowell untangled the mass it was found that the boys had been throwed for a vard loss. A trick play failed and a plunge through the weak side resulted in an- | other loss, “Better punt, man. “I was just kidding," replied the en- gineer and on the fourth attempt made a first down on a split rails play. Bill," said the fire- BY ED WYNN. Dear Mr. Wynn: I read an article in the newspaper which said that a baby in Bridgeport, Conn., feeding on elephant milk had gained 42 pounds e tion must have been asleep,” I sug- gests, “when they let the President have that much power.” “They never were more awake,” says Finnegan. “They knew that the country would never get anywhere if they had about 11 political parties squabbling all the time like they do in France. So they fixed it kind of under cover that the President would really be a dictator with a bunch of aristocrats in the Senate to help his game along."” “Why is it,” T asks, “that people object to dictators if they're so good for ‘em?” “For the same reason.” says “High Dome,” “that they don’t h’::: vowder mills near their homes. ere’s no telling when they’ll explode and mess up the scener/ “HE RUN UP HERE AND JUMPED IN AND HANDED ME ONE OF THESE HERE SIGNS THAT SAYS. ‘QUIET 1S REQU TED FOR THE BENEFIT OF THOSE WHO HAVE RETIRED.” The half ended an hour later with the train in the engineer’s possession a mile outside the yards During the intermission the train conductor come forward and give the boys a terrible bawling out. What do vou think this the " he said ve heen go- t and half the passengers Jerk 'em out of their some noise! Use rake them steam bipes pound! < up a couple of tim If I didn’t have a date in St. Petersburg next Thursday I'd make ing too vou back way to the station and start out again right!” In another two hours the train had left Jacksonville a good ten miles behind and was racing on like a pushcart with a stop every few hun- dred to give Bill @ chance to cateh up with his correspondence or Jesse, the fireman, un opportunit to study some queerly shaped tre Jesse w fascinated by queerl shaped tr It was part of his harm. But he kept his mind suffi- ciently on the business at hund to see that Bill did not weaken. For ex- ample a stop was made alongside of Ring Makes Journey by Rail in Florida And Gives Full Report of Proceedings some 2 room them embellished by “What you stopp! demand 1 At intery f 15 minute stops was m 4 lantern walked « to see if any f. through the enginee whistle fo the 1 is sa other with the tr n within vou pu might of on up on the 1 be somet don't like It makes rumor today road w wh aph 1i informed I quit the 5 went i pour le r d that would spoil it.” replied Jesse avs pretend v £0 on ke we al s been going The engineer now began to himself by blowing a_lo whistles, They wasn't crossings and nobody to cross them they had of been, and not but was a wa muse no ppose the ebody ¢ the w | would of done v other time or a couple of v ain’t what the: ill, reminiscently. me with me, one time the T wa one of thi ‘Quiet is reque those who hav v any mor h our little trip t sufficient to nefit of <. racony tence o bu thi that blundered into Belleair half a day late or practically on time none the better ‘or the adventure, wri in one week. Do you belleve that? Sincerely, I. X. PECKWON. Answer: Of course, I believe it. was a baby elephant. Dear Mr. Wynn: I understand that every musical show has its own press agent. Can you tell me what he gets the name “press agent” from? Truly yours, I M. SILLY. Answer: He gets his name from squeezing chorus girl Dear Mr. Wynn: I live in a town and to go to work I must take a ferry over the river. Why doesn’t the city government build a bridge? Yours truly, MRS. STPPIE. Answer: They're afraid it will make the people cross 1t Dear Mr. Wynn: y s who is 12 years of age, a job to br & big rock which was in our back yard. He hammered away at it for fouz hours without any result. I took the hammer and broke the rock with the first blow. What is the present generation coming to? Sincerely. AMASSA STONE. Answer: It was easy for you to break it after your son made it soft for you. Dear Mr. Wynn: A friend of mine told me he knew a married woman 53 years of age who sleeps in_the same room with cats. Do you believe this? Truly yours, X. ACKTING. Answer: Sure I believe it. Your friend probably is referring to Mrs. <atz. Dear Mr. Wynn: There is a man ing next door to me who drinks heavily and is nearly always drunk drink at all, vet I have only nds he has. How do you account for that? Yours truly, T. TOTALER. Answer] You say he is always In Some Ways Society Today Is Different From That of a Quarter of a Century Ago drunk. That's the reason, He sees twice as many people as you do, Dear Mr. old and school. a “Southern the teacher Wynn: T am 8 years the fourth grade in I have to write a story about pl What does mean “Southern am in nter.” by a 1. PUPIL. : A “Southern planter,” my an undertaker who operates only in the South. Dear Mr. Wynn: I have a new servant. She has been with me a week and the dust is so thick on the plano T wrote my name in the dust with my finger and showed it to her. re looked at it and said: “You're for- inate to be e to write "so nice What can I do?” Sincerely, i MISS TRESS. Answer next week. E PERFECT FOOBa (Copyright, 1926.) i