Evening Star Newspaper, December 23, 1934, Page 73

D. ¢, DECEMBER 23, 1034, here’s not much you can do tonight,” officer said. “Everything’s closed up. course, if he was mad I could shoot Well, he isn’t.” Niles was a little testy. [No, sir,” agreed the officer cheerfully. en feeling that he had done all he 1d: “Well, good-night,” he said. “A rry Christmas to you.” liles looked at the dog. The dog looked [Niles. Then Niles hailed a taxi. “Get " he said. n the apartment there was at first sign of Olive. Niles hastily parked the b in the guest room bath with a bowl water and a plate of scraps. Then went into the living room. Olive was bre, sitting on the floor half buried in ber. Muggins’ small empty stocking gled suggestively over the fireplace. HEN Niles came in, Olive sprang up, scattering presents. “Oh, I didn’t hr you,” she gasped. “I've been frantic. lhought you’d been run over and were la hospital alone and unconscious.” bhe hugged him. “I was miserable pugh to howl,” she elaborately dra- tically. iles kissed her. His big hands shook ittle, absurdly, as he roughly stroked Ir smooth hair. ‘Nice of you to worry,” he said grate= ly. Bhe laughed at that. “Charming of not to get run over,” she mocked him ectionately, adding, “Come on out in e kitchen.” iles helped her forage. His momen=- ry glow evaporated. Of course, she ways worried about any one she was nd of. And she was fond of him, he d no reason to doubt that, at least. He hadn’t much appetite, but Olive e placidly. “Let’s cover Muggins,” she id after awhile, “and then go back and P up presents.” ogether they went into the baby’s om. She lay sprawled all over her liculous small pink bed, various parts her plump anatomy exposed to the r winds. When her parents came in e opened one eye and grinned wsily. ‘Chris’miss presint,s,.—" she drawled phatically, and immediately was leep again. [Niles looked at her for a long time. ck in the living room, he said, “Darl- g, let’s not do up packages, not yet yway. I want to talk.” ‘There’ll be time in the morning,” ive agreed. “I'll just fill Muggins’ stock- . Her things are all wrapped.” She stily fitted diminutive packages into e limp, small sock. Then she sat beside Niles on the broad uch. Niles held her tightly. “Dear,” p said, “you’ll never know how happy bu’'ve made me. I—" his voice husked hd he cleared his throat. “What I'm lving to say,” he elucidated, “is that 1 always be in debt to you for what u’'ve done, for what you've been.” “Sweetheart!” Olive sat up in alarm. re you ill?” “Why, no.” “Well, I thought you must be. You unded just exactly like a death bed— at is, as if you were on one.” She ached up a hand and caressed his oad hard cheek. He closed his eyes. isten.” Her voice was eager. “Let’s ve each other our present now. All one like this, it’ll be more fun.” He followed her into his own study ich she had to unlock. “I was afraid bu’d barge in,” she explained. She vitched on a light and stood aside, her hnds clasped tightly, patiently on tiptoe r him to be surprised. He looked around him and in spite of mself, he grinned in spontaneous easure. There was a solid-looking ench in front of him and on it lay big ocks of colored modeling clays. Strange tle tools and gadgets were inserted in its around the work table and a book y on it. “For the Advanced Student of odeling,” Niles read. “Don’t you like it? You can make me ndreds of those adorable figurines bw. Wasn't it a brain wave?” Olive nplored him as he stood speechless. And, darling, I bought it myself.” “Yourself?” Niles fingered the clays vingly. “What do you mean?” “Well.” Olive hung on his arm. “You e pleased?” He kissed her. “All right, en. You see I love spending your oney. Everything I get—even tooth- shes—are gifts from you and it makes e feel loved and cherished. But I hate buying you things out of the money you give me. So—I earned it.” She gave her own quick little gurgle of laughter. “You’'ll never guess how.” She smiled up into his face. “I sold bonds for Phil Owen and we split commissions! I knew you’d be surprised.” Then some- thing in his silence struck her and she added quickly, “Of course, no one knew. I thought you wouldn’t want that. And I wasn’t robbing Phil because I really and truly increased his sales. I know so many of your friends and they were swell. But I was scared to death you'd find out and spoil the surprise. It was fun,” she added reflectively, “and I have enough money left over for your birthday. Oh, my goodness!” 5 Niles had caught her in a hard em- brace, his lips against her hair were murmuring brokenly. She clung to him for a moment then gently disengaged herself. “Now, where’s my present?” she de- manded gayly. SILENTLY he gave her the check, fran- tically, desperately hoping the sum would have no meaning for her. She glanced at the slip of yellow paper. “Oh, nice,” she said carelessly. “To spend on the cruise? Lavish old darling. But I meant my real present—the thing you bought for me.” Niles went cold. What on earth should he say? What could he give her? He racked his brains. What had he that was possible? Not Aunt Emma’s shawl; not his mother’s discreet black bag—— Not—suddenly, the dog in the bath room emitted a long-drawn howl. Olive started. “Darling, you got me a dog!™ she exclaimed and started in the direc tion of the blood curdling yelps. Silent with dread Niles followed her. Should he say the horror had been sent by mistake instead of the Pekingese he had ordered? Could he pretend it was some new kind of hunting dog? Then the yelps died and he heard his wife’s voice. “Was a beautiful, adorable mon- grel cur, so it was—-—" She looked up as Niles came slowly into the room. “Sweetheart,” she said, and her voice was rich with love. “How dear of you—but how dear. Imagine your having the understanding to know how I missed the ‘just plain dogs’ we had down home. Anybody else—— but then——" she interrupted herself, put the pup away affectionately and, getting to her feet, clasped Niles around his prophecy of a bay window. “You aren’t anybody else, thank God! Oh, thank God for you, darling!” Niles was silent. He held her gently as if he were afraid she might melt away. She was murmuring, “So happy— everything so perfect—you—Muggins and all my Christmas presents bought for once. Oh, my sainted aunt!” She looked up, her eyes round with horror. “I clean forgot,” she explained breath- lessly, “to get one single, solitary thing for Phil Owen!” And Niles broke down. The evening had been entirely too much for him. The room shook with his laughter. Finally he swung Olive clean off her feet. “Give him something of mine,” he managed to gasp. “Give him my pearl studs, give him my cigarette case, give him my car.” A reproachful voice broke in on Olive’s bewilderment and she turned only a second before Niles wheeled. Muggins was standing in the doorway. “Chris’'miss presints?” she asked with obvious distrust. Olive picked her up and her father poked her jovially in the ribs. “You’re darned right there’ll be Chris’miss presints.” He told her. He hugged Olive. “Dump her in, you lazy little loafer,” he said, “and help me do up the rest of these things.” (Copyright, 1934.) Oil Loss Heavy THE handling of oil from the well to the refinery has always been a costly proposi- tion, because of the loss through evaporation of the lighter hydrocarbons. However, condi- tions have improved and the losses are not run- ning as high as they did 10 years ago, when the average was about 6.2 per cent. Investi- gation recently led to the belief that the loss now is down as low as 2 per cent, perhaps, but even at that figure the annual loss would be in excess of 13,000,000 barrels. RUSSIA—YEA AND NAY Continued from Fourth Page. sia into one vast escape-proof prison filled with helpless inmates who are forced to do what the Soviet theorists think is good for them. There is no pretense at pity, no soft talk about “hu- manity.” Every new move is made with & broadside blow, without the slightest con- sideration for the human agony end disruption it will cause. HE Soviets know how dfficult it is to force the older generation to swallow their par- ticular brand of dictatorship—the generation that once was accustomed to the vices of per- sonal liberty and unhampered access to knowl- edge. But the Soviets have successfully seized the children and brought them up to be perfect, handmade Communists, inoculated from in- fancy with a passionate desire to keep the working classes in the saddle, and with a pro- found fear of capitalism. They have been rigorously guarded from knowledge concerning social systems other than their own and taught to believe in their new religion with a fanatical faith. Bolshevism is a religion, just as much as the organized Christianity it destroyed. The Bol- sheviks have substituted Karl Marx for God and made Lenin his prophet. They have be- come as dogmatic, as intolerant, as militant, as the fiercest Christian zealots of the Middle Ages. They will convert you or send you to Siberia. I have seen violent cases get up in public and tell how Communism has redeemed them from political sin—with trembling voices and shining eyes, just like those who hit Billy Sunday’s sawdust trail. They will suffer gladly —even die—for their communistic convictions. It is this very fanaticism, combined with a convenient primitive ignorance, that has en- abled the Bolsheviks to achieve so astoundingly much. It is this regilious mania that has brought miracles to pass. With one breath the dictatorship has said: “Let there be no more churches.” With the next breath they have said: “Let there be no more illiteracy.” And illiteracy disappeared as quickly and thoroughly as the churches. With another gesture, all the little peasant farmers were forced to collect on big farms and to work in large teams. This uprooting caused 8 hundred million broken hearts and violent resistance. But the state, flinging aside all opposition, soon controlled the imagination and enthusiasm of the children who had as vet developed no special attachment to their homes, and with these young converts the government managed to raise the efficiency, comfort, cultural level of the farms, as well as quantity of farm products, almost 100 per cent. Industrially, Russia has leaped, under this violent new spirit, from last place almost to first. Her factories, her mines, her steel mills, roar and hum and belch smoke 24 hours a day. The demand is miles ahead of the supply. New office buildings, new apartments, are ris- ing with incredible speed. The builders work with a perfect frenzy. Volunteers beg to be allowed to help, as in the old days volunteers once begged to help build a new cathedral. Here in Moscow, only last week, a thousand university students, with a wave of cheering, flung themselves upon the job of paving a public square, and without any compensation whatsoever drove through with an enthusiasm that allowed them no rest until the work was done. Half the population of Moscow has helped, manuaily, as volunteers, to build the new sub- way. These workers, paid or unpaid, skilled or un- skilled, go marching and cheering and singing along the streets day and night—bands play- ing, banners waving. This marvelous team spirit among the young Communists, this eagere ness to efface themselves in order to uplift the communal whole, brings a lump to one'’s throag and tears to one’s eyes. On November 7 I witnessed a gigantic demon- stration of this political patriotism on Moscow’s magnificent Red Square. It was to celebrate the seventeenth anmiversary of the Soviet regime, I stood within 100 feet of Stalin and his minise ters and for hours watched the pageant pass by Lenin’s tomb, on one corner of which was Stalin’s reviewing stand. One hundred thou- sand soldiers, faces aglow with crusadic light, saluted the master—wave after wave. Their cheering made the very Kremlin towers shake as it rolled from battalion to battalion through the square. With this vast army at attention before him, Comrade Voroshilov, minister of national de- fense, standing besides Stalin, stepped to the radio loudspeaker. His voice roared out: “I salute you, comrade soldiers, I salute you, comrade visitors. And I shout to the world that Russia does not want war. Russia hates war with her whole soul. But let our enemies beware. We have—we are—the finest army in the world. We will defend our policies to the last man. Not an inch of land, not one ounce of pride, will we surrender.” As he spoke his last dramatic word a mil- itary band of 1,000 pieces burst forth with the *“Internationale.” The volume of tone made one’s eardrum ache. The wave of cheers were taken up like wild fire by the people waiting around the Kremlin walls—cheering, cheering, cheering—down the streets packed with patriots, across the river, along the quays, on beyond the city. Five million people joined in the loudest, longest cheer in history. NCE more the columns moved. Ten thou- sand cavalrymen galloped by. And tanks! I am sure more tanks passed that day than are owned by all the other armies in the world. I counted 400 before giving up. Some were monsters weighing 40 tons. Several of the smaller ones dashed across the square at 60 miles an hour. Overhead the sky w. ; black with fighting planes. The Russian Army is supposed to possess 5,000. I believe they were all flying at once that day. The Max @ Gorky roared above us, its eight engines wiue open. It is the largest land plane ever built. spreading its wings 200 feet. Then, once the bewildering array of fighting men had marched, ridden, rolled and flown before Stalin, the proletariat parade began. Two and one-half million workers marchcd through Red Square that day—a river, a tical wave of humanity. Every factory, every trade, every school, every bureau, turned out with all its members, with banners, floats, piacards, music, of a thousand kinds to prove their loyalty to the sacred cause. I left the Red Square after the first: million civilians had passed. I was too dizzy to endure more—dizzy from the numbers of moving legs and heads, dizzy from standing seven hours, dizzy from the waves of enthusiasm and energy that had engulfed me. : I tottered home, asking myself how 'such a tyranny could achieve so much, how the work- ers’ leaders, so utterly indifferent to the lives and hearts of the marching millions, were able to win such a magnificent response. I kmew the answer—universal education, complete emanci- pation of women, elimination of crime, ‘prisons, unemployment, physical misery. Many of these new ideas, born with such travail, we must accept—and the sooner the better. Thus is America going to develop, per- force, in the direction of new Russia’s enlight- ened attitude toward the masses, while Russia at the same time develops toward America’s ideals of personal and intellectual liberiy. The two greatest nations in the world must some day meet on the common ground of friendshin and understanding, for both will have contrib= uted something vital and enduring each to the other, (Copyright. 1934.) Christmas Library Cogtinued From Third Page, Ppunishes them by relegating them to the back of his large, rambling, unordered bookcases and forgets them. Others he rereads in season and out because he likes the zest and swing of their poetry or the originality of their prose. ' His favorite of all Christmas literature is George Wither's “A Christmas Carroll.” It speaks clearest to him of a bygone era. He likes its chant that Christmas is primarily a time to be merry. He likes to come upon such favorite old lines as “Drown sorrow in & cup of wine” and “Care will kill a cat.” The economic aspects of the season are of equal interest. Favorite “text books” on the origin and history of Christmas are by such authors as Clement Miles and W. F. Dawson, He likes their stories of seasonal largesses Henry V of England feeding friend and foe alike when Christmas found him far from home and in the act of conquering France; of Rich« ard II ordering wholesale slaughter of cattle to insure every man in England a modest Christmas pie. His real enthusiasms are for the more serious aspects of the theme. Dickens does not im= press him. He is surprised and disappointed that Shakespeare didn't make more of Christe mas. Even more distressing is the lack of interest of American writers, past and present. He thinks this is because the Puritans turned Christmas into a sort of Good Friday and g it has never recovered. Almost nothing is published nowadays, he laments, except for children, and he isn't ine terested in that. The Americans who do write make more of the giving of gifts than of the conviviality, and that, he holds, is hardly in the line of the best Christmas tradition im literature or in life. Some day, the Senator-elect avows, he’§ going to take time off and find out what he really has in his collection. He will gather the things he has in his Baltimore home and his place on the Eastern Shore and arrange and catalogue them. He says he isn't a real collector, but just a man who has bought & lot of books about Christmas because he likeg them. Old Whaling Trips N THE oid days of the whaling industry the men who went to sea in search of these prized creatures of the deep were often gone from home as long as three or four years at a time. Each whaling ship carried four sharp-prowed boats. When a whale was sighted these boats were let down into the water, each one manned by & helmsman, four carsmen and a headse man, The helmsman carried sharp harpoons, which lines were attached, and threw them into the body of the whale. Then began a great battle. The headsman dived to the bottom, and the lines on the hare poons that held him paid out for thousands of feet. Eventually, however, the whale had to come back to the surface to breathe, and then he was killed by a lance thrust in a vital spot.