Evening Star Newspaper, May 5, 1929, Page 105

THE SUNDAY STAR., WASHINGTON, D. C, MAY 5 1929—PART 7. Pitcher Who Wasn’g Needed A Base Ball Story in Five Installments. BY W. BOYCE MORGAN. IT ELUDED THE WAITING CATCHER BY MANY FEET. Prankie Lum has learned to throw a base Fail with great speed and accuracy by huri- Ing_rocks about his father's farm. In his third vear at high school. he transfers to Warmington High in the city. had overcome his tendency to dream of pitching fage while in the field, he had recently acquired the habit of occupying "AT: | idle moments out there by placing his | fingers in the proper pesition-to throw h | the curve that he was trying to learn. In the Iater half of the fifth inning | Warmington was leading, 2 to 1. Waite ™ | Roberts, who was on the mound, had pitched 'a tight game for the first four | frames, but the first hitter in the fifth | sent a sharp double to left. This seemed |to unsettle Waite, and he walked the next man. The third batter was Thomas, the Vanderport third baseman, and a consistent hitter. Frankie was playing fairly deep in | center feld when Waite pitched the first ball to Thomas. The batter con- He dreams of becoming a g00d piicher even while fielding his position, but -eases this abruptly after allowing an’ easy fiy to drop safe and being reprimanded by the coach in e third g f the season. Finally he starts getting up early enough so that he can pitch for a half hour each moning be- fore starting for school, using a mark on the barn as a target. INSTALLMENT IIL A short time after Prankie began his | nected with it for a hot hit over second solitary practice in the early morning | and the two men on the bags raced he had to end the noon session with along the paths. Frankie came in fast Tom Polonis, and for a very good rea- | for the hit, fielded it perfectly on_the son. Coach Haggerty forbade them. second bound and w like a flash The boys had never mentioned their | to catch the runner who had rounded practice to the coach and as he was| third and was racing for the plate. seldom around the athletic field at tie | Tom Polonis had jerked off his mask noon hour, he had never chanced to|and was waiting for one of the fielder's learn of it.” But one day they were just | perfcct throws, confident that the run leaving the diamond when they ran | Would be cut off, but Frankie had un- into the coach, and in response to his | consciotsly wraped his fingers about inquiries, Tom explained what they | the ball in the position for throw were doing. Coach Haggerty listened | the ofitcurve. His return was long an to him and then he looked at Frankie | low, but to his utter amazement it with an expression haif of annoyance | broke sharply halfway to the plate and | | cluded the” waiting catcher by many “So still have the pitching bug, | feet, while the runner scored and the have ym" he said. “n'sp not e?.ou fl»othflr two men stopped on third and for you to come out two weeks late and | second. still beat out a last year's veteran for | Frankie stood spellbound, He had a flelding job. You want to piteh or | just thrown an _outeu In his nothing. Is that it?” | amazement at this achlevement he “Why:- no,” stammered Frankie. | hardly realized that his error had tied 'm glad to play center field, only— | the score. He trotted back to his place only—well, I do want to learn to throw | gazing at his fingers ih awe. At last and half of amusement. the game was close. Although Frankie | &%e BOYS an Gl | a curve. . Maybe-if I could throw a ' curve you could use me in-the box some His how the coach was looking at him. “Good night!” said the coach in disgust. “You sure are a stubborn one, aren’t you? Well, if you want to be a the knack of it had come to him! Before he had time to recover from his surpise. the harassed Waite had thrown two balls to the mext batter. On the third pitch a high fiy was hit between center and right. ways tried for such balls with runners on the bags, by the coach's orders, for Prankie al- | pitcher I guess I can't make you stop ‘wanting, but I can make you stop prac- ticing at noon, and thrt'l exaetly what I'm dgi‘n‘r! ‘You two fellows get enough base when you're out with the squad, and I don't want you going stale. 8o cut out these sessions. Understand?” ‘The boys nodded and without another word ed beck toward the school. Coach Haggerty gazed after them, and then his mouth, which had been very stern, twitched with amusement. scoring, but Vanderport now had a one- “You've got to hand it to that hay- | run lead. As Frankie approached the seed,” he admitted admiringly to him- | bench, nervously watching the coach, self. “He certainly knows what he | that gentleman rose to meet him. wants and goes after it. And Tom's a| “Well" he exclaimed. “Just what good kid for helping him that way, t00. | happened to you? You never had two But confound it all, I know what posi- | such rotten throws in_your life tions I want my flnyen to play, and " said Prankie humbly. they are going to play them!” “The throws turned into outcurves, I Even though the coack had prohibit- | gidn’t mean it.” ed the noon practice—and both Frankie “That's what comes of this pitching and Tom admitted that he was justified | bug you have,” said the coach sternly. in doing that—he could not stop the | “One, more throw like that out of you ambitious boy from gefting up early to | and you warm the bench. throw at the target on the wall of the Coach Haggerty meant it. In the barn. And so this was & dally event, | seventh inning, with an easy throw to while Warmington's season went on suc- | second, Frankie threw the curve again cessfully, with only one defeat out of | and a runner was safe. At the end of five games played. Frankie was per- | the inning a substitute took his place forming well in the outfleld and his | in the batting line-up. 3 batting was second only to that of Capt.| Frankie slumped down on the Pencb. Belden, so he was a valuable man in | literally dazed. Tom edged over by the line-up. | him and patted him on the b“’l‘]' ki ‘Then came the tragedy, so une: ted “Never mind,” he said. “We l, that it left Frankie dazed, yet really not | our slumps, Bu¥ what h-mrnt%- surprising. The morning practice bore “That curve.” said Frankie Elp!:' fruit in an unexpected way. Tom had e tried to throw it fn‘r ‘;1”: predicted that if Frankie would persist | t ¢ o] in his efforts to throw an outcurve, it | e would come to him all of a sudden, and | straight. s that is exactly what happened. But it | “Gosh!” exclaimed Tom in an awed ha&pflneld at & rrnl(‘i::‘ un(crt\iml; th‘?e. | volce. armington was playing Van- e derport that day, away from home, and (To be continued next Sunday.) El Comancho’s Campfire Stories Thus Nature uses this clear his exceptional throwing arm often saved runs from scoring. He took th:flfly 'lt‘l;o\tx:.' lec‘\ellty 1'.:12 | again cas e plate, | thine ne. %\mfimfly that he must throw strafght, but again. to his utter consternation, the ball curved sharply outward and crossed the first base line, finally bounding against the wall of th» stands. Another run was in! The inning ended without further tely. “T’ :rfdynov T've learned and I can’ anything else. I can’t throw a : z vould burst. Ridges in the Bark of Trees. o cxp‘:;x?slcn to force the sa) No doubt you have noticed that the f (which, by the bark of nearly all kinds of trees is full | Ut thropeh e e o ine e It of wrinkles and ridges as though it hiad | iy comes out through the sap tube, been split partly open. Have you ever |y} of the leaf. topped to think what made these little ;{,‘f;"’;’m,‘f';,f,‘:h“{‘::‘;l’,{efi Sooactutid: :’;;‘Nm", or tried to find out what causes ;o materials which sre "'°“‘2‘“‘,’.': em? vi are now slime, an The fact s, the ridges are the high | %10, e 830 v o from the leat e lahe Tl e el | through other tubes and discharged be- in the barks, and these cracks are made | {y wood of the tree e by slow pressure outward from the in- | bace” o Jorm & new laver of wood gide toward the surface. This is done | around the tree and thus make it grow by the formation of new wood as the within, tree grows in the Spring and Summer. mw'?im he tree expanding in this way ‘What takes place is very simple, once | (ymething has to give, and the bark you understand it. but the marvelous | eging to crack open very slowly under thing is that it should be possible for | ine enormous pressure from within. The a tree to force sap between the tree | result is the splitting of the bark in ot 20, U5, SO, G e | e o placcs i fom 1 T s , | kles that you see. going to tell you exactly how it comes | story of 'my growth of a tree is behind about. | those little ridges that you see in its In the Autumn the tree sheds its bark. leaves, sends its sap down, and goes | to sleep until the following Spring. Then when warm days tnmeau ain, ‘Tt! sun shines on the tree and heats it. 5 Now, it is a well-known gact that heat | ()NE of the greatest potential sources expands things, while €old contracts | “~of electrical energy for the future in them, and the warm sunshine expands | the United Stafes lies in the State of Ore- the tree, or makes it swell and spread. o % This creates suction in the thnusands‘!rnvl lclcos-dlns to a report by the Ge. ological of little tubes in the wood of the tree the Interior. y Ve vn larger with e i 'y Experts have surveyed over 1,600 miles nothing to fill the extra space. These little tubes then act as pipes which suck | of rivers and 50 dam sites and 7eolof cal reports have bcen made on up the tree’s watery sap until it mounts 0 the highest Bud on the highest twig | other, dan:u;nucm;al{h:xfim e 3 h the folde s estima 3 CLHLERCR B able horsepower of the State is 5,89 bud. making it expand also. ‘Without “(his expansicn _caused by | 000 for 50 per cent of the time, or rough: the sun’s heat, there would be no force within _the tree sufficiently strong to push the leaf out from the inner side of the bud, and unwrinkle it so that it finally becomes flat and straight. Once the new leaf is out, the sep from within the pore tubes of the tree forces it to w larger, for the sun-warmed spread- | survey officials classify 20,000,000 acres m sap must go somewhere or the tree of land as arid and non-irrigable. Oregon’s Power. tential of the States. water power water sites. \ | | urvey of the Department of | the boys in self-reliance, makes them 1y about 10 per cent of the total po-|pack 12 miles to the eastward United | Nord for 12 days. It was a trying time | ‘This report indicates that 645,000 | assurance we should not be there all acres of public lands are valuable as | Winter. The weather, too, was dampen- | higher than the reindeer’s neck, yet he This is the third in a series of articles on adventure in the Siberian arctic. The author, a World” country to make an in- vestigation of trading conditions. He traveled in the schooner Iskum, a stanch little fce- breaker. Imprisoned bx huge ice-packs or drifting in floes, the ship was in constant danger. Before the eyes of the crew, an- other American schooner was ‘cmshed to splinters in crashing ce. BY JAMES M. ASHTON. PFTER our first trip on foot to Cape Nord, we limbered up our muscles with much ice-walking, and were able to {o some dis- tance on tramps of exploration. All that we could see on these hikes |of ours confirmed the pessimistic re- ports of the native hunters, who assured us there was no possible chance of the schooner being. able {o break througi the ice farther west. ‘The settlement at Cape Nord was col mainly of natives and half- breeds, though we met a few Russlans engaged o trading, most of whom ap- peared o be located there p2rmanently ‘We found the natives along this par of the coast an interesting change after | our too-persistent hordes of visiting Chukchis. After leaving Kaluchin, one meets fewer and fewer of the latter, and the farther west one goes, the deeper one penetrates into the country of the Deermen. These reindeer herders were a quite different and, it seemed to us, & much higher type than eithér Chukchi or Eskimo. They were taller and more alert, both physically and mentally. Shrewd traders, too, though spoiled somewhat by unfalr dealing, making them suspicious and inclined to grasping. 'L'he¥| spoke a dialect different from Chukchi, and there was a slight differ- | ence in their methods of igloo construc- tion. Unlike the Chukchi, they were, for the most part, content with one wife. ‘Whether this moderation was an eco- nomic measure, or tribal custom, I was unable to learn. When I use the word “tribal.” in con- nection either with the Chukchis or Deermen. it iz, strickly speaking. incor- rect. These natives do not band them- selves together in tribes. as our North American Indians do: but live in scat- tered settlements, or villages, having friendly and trading relations befween communities, government. are distinct between the various types of natives, * k% % THI Deermen hunt and trap, as do the Chukchis, but their main re- liance for food, clothing and barter is on their immense reindeer herds, which are not the Pmuny of indi- viduals, but a sort of community pos- session. These are tended by the chil- dren of the village. Sometimes, we learned. these children will be up in the hills for weeks, alone with their placid, browsing charges. But we saw, too, that there was al- ways an igloo or two in the settlement from which (with an antiquated ship's spyglass, acquired in the way of trade), some old woman, mother or grand- | mother of one of the little herders, was | able to keep a watchful eye on the | movements of the herd, and report that all was well with the youngsters on guard up there, | Many a time I have come on a wrin- | kled, toothless native woman, spyglass pressed close to her peering old eves, standing patiently for half-hours at a time by her igloo doorway, assuring herself that no trouble had come to the youngster several miles away. On at least one occasion I was able to watch the preparations of one of these little sturdy, resourceful native boys, to face a sudden snowstorm, by making clever use of the only available shelter at hand—the haicy bodies of the reindeer | themselves, The little chap's head might be no | | would fearlessly kick and tug two of the animals into the position fie' want- ed them to assume against the storm; | force them with another savage kick to lie down side by side and then, himself, slip softly in between the two big warm bodies and lie there snug and sheltered until the bilzzard had blown itself out. 1 suppose it is splendid training for hardy in body, and instills a habit of resourcefulness and courage early in life, which is a vital factor in native existence. However, to our Anglo-Saxon trzined minds, it seemed a bit Spartan, for many of the children were very young. Now we had been fast in the ice- f Cape for every one on board, as we had no ing to the spirits. It alternately hailed In contrast to this great wealth, the (and snowed for practically the entire riod. Toward the end of the time he snow increased to blizzard violence, but no common chief or | Yet the racial differences | | et and froze solidly to deck, cargo and rig- ging, making it hard to get about. The sailors were kept almost steadily work scraping the snow off the deck cargo and shaking it out of the tar- paulins. It was grueling and discourag- ing labor. No sooner did they have things fairly clear than the snow would come down harder than ever, accom- panied by icy blasts of wind out of the done over again. B o ON the thirteenth day a thaw came and we were free. We headed back | to_the village of Whalen. It was late enough now to notice the longer nights, and henceforth they would grow in length until the sun hid his face from us entirely. Of course we hoped to be safely out of the Arctic be~ fore that melanchoiy time came around. At Whalen we met a certain Dr. | George Nechepoorenco, who introduced | himself as representing “The Co-opera- | tive Bolshevik traders of the Chukotsk | peninsula.” He was also acting gov- ernor, or something equivalent. ‘The Whalen Chukchis welcomed the return of the schooner by enthusiasti- cally swarming on board. We did some trading, but most of our business that first day was with Dr. Nechepoorenco, who had a long list of wants. He rep- resented to us that the population of Whalen was threatened by a serious famine, unless we would go over to Nome, purchase supplie and bring them back to Siberia. The people de- gended upon some Russian vessel to ring supplies for the coming Winter. ‘This vessel had failed to appear, and ‘was now so long overdue they had given her up entirely. General appearances and the condi- tion of the natives seemed to verify the | doctor’s statements. Seal and were scarce and the natives had taken to eating whatever dead ones they could B¢\ find. I know of nothing more terrible than hunger in the Arctic, for with its fewer distractions and ways of re- lief, it becomes an obsession that preys upon the mind and seems to affect the brain as well as the hody. This proposition disarranged our plans most unfortunately, as the trip to Nome d back would mezn a dangerous de- lay in getting out of the Arctic before ‘Winter. But one cannot, in cold blood, condemn an entire settlement of men, certain death by starvation when it is possible to avert it, so we agreed to make the trip. A southerly gale and much floating [ice off the Cape kept us at Whalen station at Sanivina Straits. The trip there was attended by heavy swells, but we were from ice peril for the first time since we encountered dangerous ice off Indian Point at the beginning of the voyage. Since that time we had been 58 days in the Arctic packs and leads, waging an almost hourly battle against the ice, and the relief to strained nerves was tremendous when we found ourselves, for the time being at least, not under the necessity of keeping a day-and-nigh® vigil. We spent ebout 24 hours at Sanivina and left for Nome in the teeth of a driving northeaster and a wild sea. If we had retained the supplies intended for our Kolyma station, which we had unloaded at Kaluchin, to be forwarded when possible, we might have spared ourselves the hazardous journev ahead, for these provisions compriscd pretty much what the people of Whalen needed. On account of the ice condi~ tions behind us, a return trip to Kalu- chin would bave been a far greater gamble than the Nome trip, We had a stormy passage. Every- thing movable on the schooner rolled and tumbled about. The seas were high, and the wind blew with gale strength, but the stanch little boat stayed right on the job and bucked her ‘'way through, * ok ok % W! made Nome very early the fol- lowing moming, and I at once went ashore with the captaln and en- ineer, Although we were racing against the Arctic night and a frozen Bering Sea, unforezeen delays cronped up, and i% was not until the morning of our fourth | day that we were actually ready to pull out, taking with us 10 natives— Fskimos—whose homes were at Fast Cape, and who were anxious to return there before Winter. In addition to these natives, who made a decided overload for the already heavily laden schooner, we took three of their fav- orite dogs and towed their big whale- boat astern. - If their plight, stranded at Nome without friends, had not been so des- perate, we would not have considered the matter, but there seemed no help for it, They begged and besought us piteously to return them to their homes. As two of their number were women yand one a little child, we could not , find it in our hearts or conscience to leave them to certain misery where they were. Of course, on® might well ask what they had planned to do about getting back to East Cape in the first place. They certainly could not know that the Iskum would happen along so con- veniently. ‘ northwest, and the work all had to be alrus | women and little children to almost | until daylight, when we sailed for our | ~ 7 ¥ i But then, that is the North. One is obliged. by the absence of any kind of | established communication, to depend largely upon a lucky chance for getting to one's_chosen destination. And the natives, being more or less like children, had probably merely assumed. blithely and optimistically, that something would turn up to solve thelr proplem—and ¢ did. “It” was ourselves in this particu- lar case. had on board, and so many additional passengers, we dared not attempt the return crossing to Whalen by the direct route. So going north, we hugged the Alaskan shore, and crossed by the Dio- medes—Big and Little—to East Cape. From there we continued on our wa §fe§m! under the lee of the cape’s bi uff. It was as risky a bit of sailing as I ever want to undertake. sooner entered the Arctic Ocean than it set out to show us it could live up to its reputation. The schooner was badly strained by her overload, and as the propeller had been damaged in fighting ice and we had not been able to repair it at Nome or put in the new propeller we carried for an emergency, things looked more than & little pre- carfous for a while, On this trip from Nome to East Cape, some one on board asked one of the Eskimo women how she would like to see the . country we came from— America. She said emphatically: “No, no, too much hot!” And her companions all a with her that the heat would undoubtedly kill them, or at least, make them very sick. an amusing conception of what they term “outside,” in which I found all the natives I met heartily concurred. . N our arrival at East Cape we thankfully shed our Eskimos, their dogs, and the whale boat. It was cer- tainly a relief to get that part of the business successfully over and done with. We then rounded the big, rocky cape ftself, and so made our way back to Whalen, having a little trouble with ice on the way, though not enough to block us at any point. At Whalen trouble of a different sort ‘was walting for us. Nechepoorenco ap- | peared to have entirely forgotten all his former anxiety on his people’s behalf. He utterly disregarded the inconven- | fence and danger we had undergone | to obtain his supplies; and after much | talking led nowhere, it soon became ap- | parent that he was prepared to dis- | regard shamelessly all the terms of our_agreement. The reason for this, we later learned, vas that the schooner Chukotsk ha | come down from Cape Nord during our absence at Nome and was then at Na- tan. From her Nechepoorenco believed | he could obtain the supplies he needed, |and on more adyantageous terms, since she would be going out of the Arctic {soon and would be anxious to get rid of | all_superfluous goods and provisions. Neahepoorenco was not what one | would call reliable. We found during our stay in that part of the world that the word or agreement of one of his type is never good until the deal is an accomplished fact. That we had risked not only our schooner but lives as well to accommodate him and his people mattered nothing to him in comparison with the chance of saving a few dollars of barter by buying from the Chukotsk, leaving us “stuck” with the Nome cargo | bought up on his order, and because of his imploring requests. ‘The following morning our engineer | reported that our fuel tanks were get- ting low. Out of cur original store of | 7,000 gallons of fuel oil we had already | | consumed 4,000. We must make the re- | maining 3,000 count, at all costs, and use our sails instead of our engines With such a heavy cargo as we now | We had no | haq RLS PAGE TOSSED ABOUT IN ICY WA. TERS, T WAS FINALLY FLUNG TUP AGAINST ONE OF THE BIG ROCKS ON THE BEACH. On our arrival at Sanivina we ran into a bad storm, which prevented our discharging the cargo that day. matian sailor, and “David” offering to take charge of managing the transfe ‘The only result of their efforts, how- ever, was that the dory was swept out to sea by the storm and we had to fol- low in the schooner. It took us three and a half hours of very anxious work before we rescued them and got both men and dory back on the schooner. We then returned to Sanivina and anchored off the station until morning, waiting for the wind and heavy seas to_abate. In the morning, however, the gale was blowing with as much violence as on the day before, making it im- possible to get ashore or for those at the station to come to us. Our anchor dragged a quarter of a mile during the night, but we were lucky to have had nothing worse happen. We spent the day trying to rearrange | things in the cabin so we could all be more comfortable. But on account of CRAFTS ) OKES PUZZLES Hunting th Néw Arrival Si e Fruit Fly s Government BY C. MORAN We | tried it, using the dory: Ivan, the Dal-| GOVERNMENT EXPERTS DELVI NG INTO THE LIFE HISTORIES S, MASS. OF INSECTS AT MELROSE HIGHL (Continued From Fifth Page.) eral million insects of six species of parasiter that prey upon the corn borer have been distributed in New England States and areas of the Corn Belt. ‘The department'ssearch for parasites of the corn borer is/being intensified as part of the national campaign against this pest. Entomologists with head- quarters at Hyeres, France, are secking the parasites in France, Italy, Spain and Portugal. As. yet only 12 species of parasites of the corn borer have been found, of which 6 have become estab- lished in this country. the entomologist is to find parasites | which will attack the borer in each | stage of its development. Many species of introduced parasites and predacious insects captured in for- eign countries by the Government ento- mologists are assisting in holding in check the scale insects, aphids and mealybugs in the, citrus orchards of | Florida and California. In California | these beneficial species are being reared |in laboratories in, large numbers and { liberated among the insects which they The ideal of | | the pit musel | are expected to destroy. Perhaps no e aamamE of e vesscl. | C fer method of holding fruit inscets in Late i the attitnoon the wind mod- | control, say the. entomologists, has erated and we were able to get soms |greater promise than this practice of cargo ashore, The natives helped us |uUSing the natural enemies to destroy | with their whale boat on account of | the harmful species of insects, whenever possible. However, we could shift to sail almost | entirely if put to it, for the wind was | one thing we never lacked in those | stormy regions at the top of the world. | ‘The principal worry with which we were | faced at the moment was the ungrate- ful—not to say dishonorable—attitude | cting Gov.” Nechepoorenco in try- | ing to crawl out of his bargain. We finally had to make a second | agreement to get rid of the Nome stores, and that ended the business keeping us at Whalen. As the weather was still fair, and the ice held off shore by the wind, we put to sea at 8 that evening. S I HAD found at Whalen an old friend, | a native boy whose cheerfulness and splendid physique had won my ad- miration at the commencement of the | voyage. He was the image of Michel- | angelo’s “David.” We had left him at Whalen on our | | trip west, and he seemed to have fallen for when he came down to beg us to take him | back to his home in Sanivina he was hungry and sick—poisoned by bad alco- hol given him by some Jap traders, These same Japanese were afterward | drowned in a drunken brawl near | Whalen, and seeing what they had done | to my splendid “David” I could not | find it in my heart to regret their tak- ing off. We fed and doctored the boy to the best of our ability, and due to his mag- nificent health and physical strength he came through all righ’ On the last trip I went ashore in the whale boat with the Eskimos (we were back once more in the Eskimos' coun- try), and in making the surf landing— | jumping overside and between combers, as was necessary—I linrered a second too long in r!ckmg up one of my fur gauntlets which I had dropped. I tried to make up that precious, lost instant by running at my best speed. but was | badly hampered by my fur clothing and | muckluks. I was just a shade too slow | —being about 20 feet behind the scurrying natives—and the next great comber, chi after-at express speed, caught me when I had some 40 or 50 feet to reach the rocks on shore. * k% x Tm ‘was no keeping one's feet at the onslaught of that wave, and down I went ignominiously enough and | was tossed about in the icy water and {finally flung up against one of the big rocks on the beach, where the natives rescued me and pulled me up, blind and drenched. {along with them, feeling most unpleas- jantly numb and dizzy. Then the Eski- {mos must have noticed my condition, | for suddenly I was picked up and car- | ried about, shaken up, and made gener- ally dizzier every moment. They knew what they were doing, however, for while the three men who had charge of me were keeping me in motion to start my frozen circulation again, the in the shelving rocks and sand, until they had made a shallow pit, rather unpleasantly resembling a grave. They next bullt a fire of dried tundra |moss and other vegetation that could be found, and succeeded in heating a lot of fair-sized stones with which they lined the pit, making a kind of primi- tive bake oven of it. The final step in the novel proceeding was to strip off my wet clothes, roll me in a reindeer skin and lower me into the improvised oven where I was ke‘)t until thoroughly dry, and most blissfully warm and com- fortable. There is no doubt that their prompt and effectual treatment saved | my life, for I was nearly gone when | (hm" pulled me out of the wave's back- | wash. | When my rescuers were satisfled that | I was fit to travel, they took me out of | my oven and insisted upon carrying me —still wrapped in reindeer skins—all the way to our station. Arrived there, I| was given dry clothing, the fire was | built up hifher. and I was planted as | closely to it as I could stand; after Which came hot coffee and some food. I had an appetite by that time and enjoyed the meal. No white man should For a few yards I managed to stumble | rest of them started digging frantically | | the heavy surf on a rocky coast, which | ® % ¥ x | made our dory useless for the purpose. HE story of how California’s fruit industry was saved by setting nat- ural enemies against the pests that were destroying crops is told by Dr. L. O. Howard, world-famous entomologist and formerly chief of the United States Bu- reau of Entomology. “There appeared upon certain acacia | trees at Menlo Park, Calif..” Dr. Hi rd | says, “a scale insect which rapidly i | creased and lrreld from tree to tree, les, figs, quinces, pome granates, roses and many other trees and plants, but seeming to prefer orange and lemon trees. This insect. which came to be known as the white scale or fluted scale, was an insignificant creature in itself. resembling a small bit of fluted white wax a lttle more than a fourth of an inch in length. “When the scales had once taken pos- session of a tree they swarmed over it until the bark was hidden: they sucked its sap through their minute beaks un- til the plant became so feeble the leaves and young fruit dropped off, a black smut fungus crept over the young twigs and weakened tree gradually died. Orchard after orchard of oranges, worth a thousand dollars or more an acre, was utterly destroyed, the best fruit- growing sections of the State were in- vaded and ruin stared the fruit growers in the face. “Two agents of the Department of Agriculture were sent to California to study the Emblem. ‘They took a year to | work out the complete life history of the | insect, and washes were discovered that, | applied to the trees in the form of a |spray, would kil a large propartion of he pests at comparatively slight ex- ense. It was soon found, however, that the average fruit grower would not take the trouble to spray his tre largely | from the fact that he had experimented for years with inferior washes and quack | mixtures, and from his lack of success | was dmufllced against liquid col unds. “Meantime, after much sifting of evi- dence and much correspondence with [ naturaists in many parts of the world, | it was decided that the white scale was |2 native cf Australia and had been | brought over to California_accidentally upon Australian plants. In the same | way it was found to have reached South Africa and New Zealand, where it had | gradually increased and had become al- most as great a pest as in California. In Australia, however, it did not seem to be abundant and was not known as & | pest, which was assumed to be evidence | of the fact that Australia was the m ! tive home of the species, and that there | must exist there some natural check to its increase. uA TRAINED collector of parasites was sent to Australia. He found | the existence of small flies which laid | thelr eggs in the fluted scales. and jlearned’ that these cggs hatched into | grubs which devoured the pests. He jalso found a remarkable little ladybird, |a small, reddish-brown -‘convex beetle | which breeds with marvelous rapidity |and which, with voracious appetite and |at the same time with discriminating | taste, devcurs scale after scale, but eats fluted scales only and does not destroy other insects. Large numbers. of lady- birds and of several other insccts were collected, packed in tin boxes and ship- in the ice box of a steamer to the United States. s “The ladybirds reached Los Angeles alive. and. with appetites sharpened by the long ocean voyage, immediately fell upon the scales and devoured them. Their hunger temporarily satisfied. they | began to lay eggs which hatched in a | few days into active grublike creatures —the larvae of the beetles—and these ‘gruha proved as voracious as their par- { ents; they devoured the scales right and {left, and in less than a month were | transformed into beeties. “Each female beetle laid, on the aver- age, 300 eggs, and each of these eggs hatched into a hungry larva. Suppose | that one-hailf of these larvae produced female beetles, a simple calculation will show that in five months a single iady- bird became the ancestor of seventy-five billions of other ladybirds, each capable | of destroying very many scale insects. In less than five years hardly a scale insect was to be found in California.” ‘The probability is. in the opinion of the Federal entomologists, that similar measures must be taken against the Mediterrancan fruit fly. Experience has | shown that once an important crop pest is introduced. it is well n’gh impossible | to_eradicate the i t. and that the | best that can be accomplished is the | limitation of its spread to other areas and the control of its devastation by means of suitable poisons and arsene !icals, as well as by setting parasites of | the insect against it in a warfare of | bug against bug. To find these parasites involves long | search in countries of origin of the host | pest; they must be nurtured and multi- plied and shipped to this country where | they will be liberated in infested areas. Should the fruit fiy gain a strong hold in Florida, strict quarantines against | the shipment of Florida fruits in inter- | state commerce must be placed in effect, a situation that will just about spell economic ruin to the Florida fruit in- dustry. Small wonder that the Government entomologists are thrown into_conster- nation; that an American President should urge upon Congress immediate "action in attacking the problem. * % *x | | | | | Banking Facts for Boys and Girls BY JOHN Y. BEATY, EDITOR OF THE BAN;EBS MONTHLY When I was a boy, my mother taught | chewing gum by the box and sold it by me to earn money in every way possible | the package. On still another occasion attempt improvement upon the methods of arctic natives when it comes to pro- | tection from the dangers with which | they are familiar. | I remained at the station that night, | sleeping on the floor near the fire on a | soft Winter reindeer skin and covered | snugly with two more. By 6 the next {morning Parsons, our trader at Sani- | vina, and I were up and got ourselves a hearty breakfast of coffee, flap-jacks | and store eges, while around us on the floor my Eskimo saviors of yesterday slept—and snored vigorously. f The greater part of that day was| ent in discharging cargo and taking! a new one of furs, ivory and whale- bone to take home with us. Later, to- ward evening, we pulled out. | Everybody on the schooner went about | saying jubilantly, “Good-by, Siberia!”, ‘We had turned our backs at last on the Siberian Arctic and our bow was headed | for—home! Taking the voyage all in all, there was certainly a lot of hard work, ten- sion, exposure and hardship to it: we| were cold, overworked and worried the | greater part of the time. Yet, like | every one who ventures into that “To) o' the World” country, I have a han kering to return. Evervthing is different there. It's like no other place in the | world and no_other experiencel ' (Copyright, 1929.) sp » I _BOUGHT CANDY BARS BY THE BOX AND SOLD THEM BY THE PA and to save it. When I was very small, | I bought candy bars by the box and she popped some corn and I went out|sold them by the package. on the streets and sold that at a profit.| As a rule, a manufacturer sells what As I grew older I learned that various| he makes in large quantities. We call | this wholesale, and we expect the per- son who buys the larger quantities to | sell them to customers in smaller quan- | tities. This part of the selling is known | as retail. When you buy a box of chew- | ing gum, you pay about 60 cents for it. [Them are 20 packages in the box and each package is retailed at 5 cents each. | In other words, you can sell a box of chewing gum for $1 when you sell the ]plcngru separately and you can ouy |the box for 60 cents. That leaves a profit of 40 cents on each box. In the same way you can buy boxes of candy bars, or you can buy packages of bluing or articles of jewelry, pens, | pencils, thread, flavoring extracts and many other things. It is an honorable thing to earn | money In this way, and if you select | an article that is needed in every home | you will not experience much difficulty | in finding customers | " 1t is usually best for a child to begin with something that does not cost too much. It would hardly be wise for a boy to try to sell washing machines that cost $160. but he can sell small articles and will be paid for his time. articles might be bought at wholesale Students of Leeds University in Eng- and sold at a me which paid me for my work in selling. I remember one time I bought 25 fi::unda of roasted peanuts, put them to small bags and sold them at a nice profit. On another occasion I bought land have promised to give 850 each as soon as possible after they graduate ;murd the cost of a §300,000 new uniox