Evening Star Newspaper, August 24, 1935, Page 6

A—6 THE EVENING STAR, THE EVENING STAR With Sunday Morning Edition. WASHINGTON, D. C. SATURDAY ...... .August 24, 1935 THEODORE W. NOYES. «..o.Editor The Evening Star Newspaper Company. Business ume- 11th St. and Pennsylve New York Office; 110, vy Chieago Office: European Office: 14 Rennt (s Rate by Curler Within the City. Regular Edition. he E{Ve-n‘ml A ey 40¢ per month Fon 4" Sundaysh o o o----00¢ per month an &uflsml Night Final llfll‘l ght Pinal and Sunday Star. ight Finai Star Collection made at be sent by mail tional 5000. Rate by Mail—Payable in Advance. Maryland and Virginia. Daily md Sunday.. { Daily only_~——mooo Sunday omiy=ZZZZZ71 . All Other States and Canada. ily and Sunday..l !r.. $12.00; 1 mo., $1.00 nll} only.__.. . 8.00; 1 mo., 75¢ Sunday only-. .00; 1 mo.. b0c Member of the Associated Press. The Assoclated Press is exclusively entitled to the use for republication of all news dispatches credited to it or not otherwise credited in this paper and also_the local news published herein, AW Tights of “publication Of Special herein are also reserved. of reiephone. Na: The Social Security Board. In signing the social security act the President suggested that the enactment of that legislation alone was of sufficient importance to have made the past ses- sion of Congress memorable. It is easily the most important legislation of the session, penetrating further into little- known territory and directly affecing more people than any enacted during this or past Congresses for many years back. Naturally, the President has devoted careful thought to selection of the So- cial Security Board, which will adminis- ter many of its most important pro- visions, and which, through its ability to master the vast and complicated task it assumes will play considerable part fn writing initial success or failure of the experiment. The President’s announcement of the board’s personnel is, then, of surpassing Interest. John G. Winant, three times Republican Governor of New Hamp- shire, chosen as chairman of the board, {s & “socially minded” New Englander, ‘with a conservative background in edu- cation, tradition and politics. His posi- tion as assistant director of the inter- national labor office in Geneva has brought him into working contact with some of the problems and theories of old-age and unemployment insurance and has been in the way of a training course for the more exacting duties which will shortly bring him to Wash- ington. Arthur J. Altmeyer, who was brought to Washington from Wisconsin as an Assistant Secretary of Labor in the Spring of 1934, will doubtless be the technician on the board. He has made a deep study of the social security theories embraced in the act and his work as secretary of the Wisconsin In- dustrial Commission has given him a wide knowledge of the field. Vincent M. Miles, the third member of the board, is little known here. His biographical sketch indicates past activities chiefly confined to the law and to politics, and his selection as the third member of the board may represent the President’s acknowledgment of the demands of politics—even in a board of this sort. The board is neither as strong nor gs weak as it might have been and un- doubtedly represents a compromise with the extreme elements with which the President had to deal. The board's prin= cipal task will be in laying the ground- work of broad policy in administering an act that will become more compli- cated as the number of beneficiaries Increases. -t Financial experts say there has not been so much agitation about a “death sentence” since Kipling described the execution of Danny Deever. P ] New Deal Art. New Deal art has been radical in character. Those responsible for the Government's endowment of painters and sculptors have been sympathetic with modetnism. By way of result a great number of abortive canvases and equally futile creations in bronze and plaster are to be seen in public build- ings in Washington and elsewhere. Even in the White House a visitor may in- spect the efforts of immature disciples of Cezanne, Van Gogh, Gauguin, Matisse, Picasso and the other less famous but not less dangerous “re- formers” of a generation ago. An even- tual bonfire is foreshadowed. But it is likely to be less easy to correct the scandal than might be sup- posed. For example, the Board of Edu- cation of Los Angeles just now is in- volved in a bitter controversy over its right to order removed from a trade school wall a hideous mural placed there by Leo Katz, an artist sponsored by the Federal authorities and paid from funds rgised by taxation. The board has decided that the composition is objectionable. Mr. Katz has retorted that, since the work was done for the National Government, the local officials cannot command its destruction. ‘The picture, of course, mpay have its friends. To its critics, however, it is a hopeless confusion of intolerable drafts- manship, impossible coloring and propa- ganda. Objects represented include, ac- cording to the painter’s description: “The constructive and destructive forces,” “a white telescope, the modern instrument that points toward the divine laws of cosmic order,” “a cannon that points to a gruesome demon of greed holding a golden skull out of which coins drop like tears from the dead eye sockets,” “a war tank,” “a machine gun with two soldiers in gas masks,” air- planes, automobiles, cinema projectors, etc. The central figure is “the youth of our generation, healthy and strong,” but blind, and with a head of moronic proportions and no hands. And gazing at the youth there is a character per- sonifying “maternal compassion and un- derstanding,™ with “a young man and a girl in a gesture as if dancing around the blue and purple flames of spiritual love,” all naked. The nightmare has been draped in cheesecloth awaiting final decision of its fate, But Mr. Katz is confident that he has nothing to fear. A group of his friends is being organ- ized to aid in the defense of his master- piece against the educators who have presumed to believe that it would have “g disturbing influence on the impres- sionable minds of children.” Perhaps in the end the problem may be committed to the youngsters them- selves to solve. Such a course would be democratic, if nothing else. And by re- sort to it the verdict of the next genera- tion might be anticipated. A natural art instinct is growing up in America, and when it attains its maturity it is almost certain to make short shrift of the experimental products of the New Deal geniuses whose spokesman Mr, Katz has come to be. ——— Italy’s Heavy Task. To the average observer it might seem that Mussolini is making his prepara- tions for war in Ethiopia out cf all pro- portion to the task of subjugating that supposedly small and weak country. He is pouring troops over to Eritrea, the Italian possession on the northern bor- der of Haille Selassie’s land, by the hundred thousands, and is equipping and shipping war planes by the score and tanks in unknown numbers. While the full measure of these forces and appliances and munitions is not known, they doubtless are on a great scale and are costing an immense sum of money. The question has arisen whether they are not disproportionate to the require- ments of such an enterprise. Those who have traveled in Ethiopia, however, have been testifying in inter- views, radio talks and published articles to the very serious difficulties ahead of Italy in this adventure. The territory of Ethiopia is not as small as might be imagined by those who have merely looked at the map of Africa, on which it appears as only a tiny patch. When an outline of it is superimposed upon a map of the United States it stretches from approximately the Atlantic Coast at the boundary between Virginia and North Carolina beyond the boundary be- tween Missouri and Kansas and from the middle of Mississippi to the middle of Wisconsin, including in the area all of the States of Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois and Missouri and half each of Georgia, Alabama, Mississippl, Towa and Wisconsin, more than half of South Carolina and Arkansas and portions of Virginia, West Virginia, Ohio, Michigan, Kansas and Oklahoma. But the size of the land is not its only factor of difficulty for an invader. The terrain is a combination of tropical jungle plain and high, jagged mountain masses. There are few poads, and those are bad. There is only one railroad, which is rated as cne of the poorest in the world. There are no great cen- ters of population, Addis Ababa, the capital, having only about 50,000 ir- habitants, with very few large struc- tures. Harar, in the east, has approxi- mately the same number. There are no physical objectives for attack and destruction outside of these two centers. Warfare in such a land is certain to tax the resources of any nation severely. In the lower lands tropical diseases await the invader to which the natives are largely immune. It is true that the Ethiopians are wretchedly equipped in arms and ammu- nition, especially the latter. They have virtually none of the modern imple- ments of war, but their land is their best defense, their disease-infested plains and their mountain masses, rising in the north to 16000 feet, offering a natural barrier against an invader. And they know their land intimately, while | the invaders must learn it at very heawy cost. They are a truculent people, fierce and fanatic. They are a courageous people, and highly skilled in the warfare of the jungle, in which they have been engaged in their own tribal conflicts for many generations. It is presumably with knowledge of these conditions—without which the proposed adventure would be foolhardy in the extreme—that Mussolini is making his preparations for war on so large a scale and at so heavy a cost. The outcome of such a war is not to be judged upon the basis of disproportion in terms of men and munitions. — e ‘The United States Supreme Court and the Congress are both splendidly housed. The White House, though still a little old fashioned, contends that authority is not to be measured entirely by architecture. ot ———— England has had experience in colo- nial management that should enable her to offer the League of Nations expert advice concerning Africa. s The Buyer Barometer. New York, which has been badly hit by the business depression during the past few years, is greatly heartened by a rec- ord arrival during July of buyers from all parts of the country. In that month 4,181 out-of-town merchants checked in at their hotels, the largest number in any July since 1929, and an increase of nearly five per cent over last year. This increase in arrivals is continuing, and recently 547 buyers registered, as com- pared with 382 on the corresponding day of the preceding week. It is reported that current gains in retail trade have surpassed expectations, and those who are watchful of these signs of business revival predct that the next few weeks will see a sharp increase in the volume of advance orders, if not an actual rush for merchandise. ‘The “buyer barometer,” as it has been called, is regarded in New York, the country’s largest distributing center of miscellaneous merchandise, particularly wearing apparel, as one that has seldom failed ,as a prophecy of prosperity. Merchants must replen- ish their stocks in anticipation of trade and they must base their orders upon indicatiops of volume, which they WASHINGTON, D. C, are in the best position to anticipate. The fact that more buyers are registering shows, furthermore, that a larger num- ber of merchants are providing against & heavier Fall trade than heretofore, This would in turn indicate that the prospect for better retail business covers a wider area. The estimates of a gen- eral increase in Fall sales range from ten to fifteen per cent, possibly more. This would suggest that in the judgment of many thousands of merchants through- out the country the corner around which prosperity has been lurking for several seasons is being turned. ——oe—s. Defense Highway. In the reconstruction of the Defense Highway, which has been proposed by the Maryland State Roads Commission in consequence of the tragedy of last Tuesday, when five persons were killed in a crash at a dangerous point on that too narrow road, there is more to be done than the widening and the elimi- nation of the treacherous dirt sidings with a curb of concrete at the edges to cause the disturbance of equilibrium. There are curves to be modified and also blanketing banks to be reduced, in order to afford more perfect vision for drivers. In short, the highway in its present condition violates all the principles of safe road making® No expense should be spared in the cor- rection of these conditions, which have cost many lives and will continue to take deadly toll as long as they remain, whatever the width of the highway or the condition of the ~sidings. The true measure of a public thoroughfare’s safety is that of its greatest use. In other words, the highway should be made safe for the largest use, which is that of the week ends, when, in present circumstances, travel upon it is not only hazardous, but preposterously slow, owing to the great congestion. This artery serves a motoring com- munity of several million people. It is a link between the Capital of the United States and the capital of Mary= land and it connects with shore resorts where multitudes of people assemble during the Summer. It should be re- garded as one of the vital arteries of the State and made to conform to the highest standard of accommodation and security. A major operation is required to bring it up to that standard, and that operation should be undertaken as speedily as possible, whatever may be the means employed to provide the necessary funds. - wee o Argument is offered that the United States, for the sake of moral influence, should retain the privilege of getting into war if it wishes. It has done no once and there is no assurance that a new deal in that line would be any luckier than the old one. v —oe—s The demand of that gentle humorist and admired official, Tom Marshall, for a good five-cent cigar has been fully met. Utilities experts are now being re- quested to consider the advantages of a five-cent car fare. — e Those who love old German traditions hope that in his elimination of groups Hitler will spare the Turnvereins and the Sangerbunds. ——— America is still rich in undeveloped resources. The new taxation deal may be the means of bringing some of them into circulation. - Shooting Stars. BY PHILANDER JOHNSON. Adjournment. Farewell! Farewell! We hear the bell Across Time's flowing tide, The ship of state we will propel O'er oceans wild and wide. To this old crew we bid adieu As for a deal we wait To show us how to tell anew A deckhand from a mate. Good-by! Good-by! We view the sky ‘With hope yet with alarm. Strange pilots we may have to try With motives free from harm. Utopian charts will cheer our hearts, We'll look for weather fair As for some spot our ship departs Which, maybe, isn't there. Songs of a Nation. “As a youngster you had a promising career.” “I still have it answered Senator Sorghum. “Only my art constituents are reminding me that, in spite of its romantic charm, ‘Oh, Promise Me,’ is no good as a campaign song.” Jud Tunkins says some politicians use loud speakers when they ought to be trying the soft answer. Selecting the Scouts. The trusts in bygone days we feared, Though sometimes we derided them. New-gilded then they reappeared, Although we subdivided them. We only ask some way to show, Amid financial dizziness, To put, while good ones bravely grow, The bad boys out of business. Ancient Brain Trust. “I wonder what the secret of Solo- mon’s wisdom could have been,” said Mr. Meekton's wife. “My dear,” said Leonidas, “think of how many wives he had acting in an advisory capacity.” Ups and Downs. We've but a little while to stay Upon this earth, strive as we may. To sleep and toil and dine and sup, So why shoot one another up? The hope of pleasure feebly clings When bombing planes are sprouting wings. ‘When Mars puts on a threatening frown, Why can’t we simply call him down? “T likes music,” said Uncle Eben, “but T can't see de sense in de drum major of a band takin’ so much credit to hisself.? P Traffic Regulation Ignores the Value of Human Life To the Editor of The Star: August 1 ushered in a financial re- sponsibility enforcement by which mo- torists who kill people in the District of Columbia will have to pay for the corpses. What is a corpse worth? Pre- cisely nothing, if produced by motor murder jn the United States. Wash- ington’s now famous drive for temporary safety netted more than 300 arrests within a single 24 hours. That, too, will pass. For 10 years the National Conference on Street- and Highways Safety, organized in 1924 by then Sec- retary of Commerce Hoover, has fought bitterly against Federal control of a growing national tragedy which so far has taken nearly half a million lives. To this obstructive agency are referred all suggestions for minimizing highways slaughter, and anything that suggests Federal control of automobile manufac- ture, distribution and operation is dis- carded as opposed to the policy of the national conference, which is to keep the issue intrastate, deny its interstate character and dodge Federal responsi- bility for saving the lives of American citizens. A few weeks ago Secretary Roper testified before a Senate com- mitte in the now deflated Mitchell charges that he and his department are controlled “by an organic law which charges me with the duty of fostering trade and commerce,” There was no qualification such as “consistently with the safety of human life and limb.” ‘The national conference is strictly a Department of Commerce product, now housed with the United States Chamber of Commerce and officered by a Cham- ber of Commerce official. And will any one say that the United States Cham- ber of Commerce cares a whoop for human life? From the beginning the automotive industry has been developed on an in- vestment of human life that is appalling, due entirely to the failure, neglect, crim- inal collusion with political power and industrial profit of the political subdi- visions of these disunited States. The National Conference on Street and Highways Safety proposes to continue this totally hopeless State control and has offered, as the net result of its 10 years of obstructing Federal protection, a set of uniform bills which have been submitted to 44 Legislatures this year, ‘The history of State failure is so com- plete that to propose a continuance of such a system is nothing less than a complete surrender to motor murder and its profiteers. States have never done anything uniformly except under pres- sure in time of war and they never will. The Lower House of Congress is a fair example of the best political subdivie sions can produce. Human life has been horribly cheap- ened by a mounting toll of dead. Jug- gernauts have run down pedestrians as if they were stray cats, hound dogs, prowling polecats on a country road. Nothing effective has been done about it. Grand juries are reluctant to indict and trial juries to convict motor mur- derers of manslaughter—perhaps be- cause so many of the jurors own auto- mobiles and don't know how to drive them safely, or have become contemp- tuous of human life themselves. Sur- rendering to this element of unfit jurors, President Roosevelt on June 17 signed a District bill creating a compromise offense known as “negligent homicide,” with an extreme penalty of one year in prison or $1,000 fine, or both. If this law is intended to beg some sort of con- viction from reluctant jurors, its net effect is to cheapen human life to the extent that “intent to kill” has to be proved if a crazy motorist mangles my 4-year-old for straying from the yard with her little doll. God gave her the right to use her feet; the accident of her escape from bondage is unhappy. but does that entitle a “negligent homicide™ motorist to kill her? Is she a stray cat? What a surrender to contempt for life that District bill is, signed by the Presi- dent as an example to the States! However begot in earnest despair it may be, the Washington drive against reckless motorists is a continuation of established futilities; the work of the National Conference on Street High- ways and Safety is obstructive and mis- leading. To conduct a safety drive in a city which has a “negligent homicide” law is a contradiction that negates all pretense of honest hope for results. Repeal the “negligent homicide” law and revalue human life. Place the in- dustry under Federal control. but not under control of the Department of Com- merce. We have paid enough human lives for industrial profits. We have murdered enough babies and old men and women who dare to use our streets and walk on the legs God gave them. Ten per cent of the drivers cause 60 per cent of ell accidents and they are still driving. That is State politics. Federal control will eliminate them and reduce casualties 60 per cent. HENRY EDWARD WARNER. - Symphony Concerts At the Water Gate ‘To the Editor of The Star. Ten thousand people gathering two nights a week to hear the Washington Symphony recitals at the Water Gate; many other thousands driving by, un- able to purchase seats; hundreds of watercraft gathered on the Potomac around the concert pavilion. What is its significance? Certain it is that it has a meaning quite beyond just another form of evening entertain- ment. Part of the answer is found in the quiet, absorbed, even rapt attention of the audience, and in the intelligent comment on the music rendered. The listeners at the Water Gate reassure us that love and appreciation of classical music have survived the noisy blare of a jazz age. That quietly intent audi- ence typifies for us the return to beauty and harmony; they embody the capacity and desire of our people to surmount the disturbed and chaotic conditions of re- cent years and to achieve an ordered harmony of life. The scene and setting of the Water Gate recitals, with their thousands of absorbed listeners, picture an epoch in our national life. The nearby memorials tell us that as a Nation we are now old enough to have our own The many-arched Memorial Bridge, the classic Lincoln Temple, the Water Gate, all blended by landscaping to a symmetry of beauty and dignity, speak with compelling eloquence of an epoch achieved; they are the hallmark of our growth beyond mere life struggle and money-getting to some achievement in the beauty, dignity and enjoyment of a cultured life. The westerning moon sinks quietly beyond historic Arlington. Overhead a great plane lifts a dozen men and women in a seemingly effortless flight to the North—symbol of our latest con- quest of space. The last encore has been given by the orchestra, and the newly inspired thousands turn homeward with a better glimpse of the possibilities of life. GEO. K. McCLELLAN. ¢ Tiny Tokens. From the Cleveland Plain-Dealer. With pockets well-stocked with these new square coins, the only thing that remains to roll under the dresser is the collar button. - SATURDAY, AUGUST 24, 1935. THIS AND THAT BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL. In looking over a copy of Jules Verne’s “Around the World in Eighty Days,” long famous as an adventure story, we were struck -by the fact that adventure and detective works have come out of their ancient classification as “children’s books.” Both of these types of fiction now- adays rank high as raoney makers for their authors and publishers, and as mighty good reading for the populace at large. Such writers as Verne and Wells, who may be said to have pioneered in this type of fiction for many of us, built their thrillers on solid facts, or approxi- mations thereof, and time has proved them. One may make a very pleasant jour- ney around the world today—unless war intervenes—in the “exceptional” time which it took Fogg to go from London to London. Fogg had to hurry a great deal. He made mathematical jumps, some one has said, from vehicle to boat and back again, in order to accomplish his thrill- ing task just on the second. Today it is possible to make a very leisurely trip around, having plenty of time at all points of interest, and get back home again in about the same time. We are not speaking, of course, of airplane travel, by means of which the old thrilling record, regarded as “just a story,” may be beat by many days. * x %% It is Interesting, In leafing through the Jules Verne tale, to see what it is, after all, which made it such a good story. It was the conversation. ‘Talk which really sounds natural and which arises naturally out of the char- acters, still is the honest basis of good fiction, whatever its classification. It is not easily manufactured, either. Every one has read books, stories by good authors, in which the conversa- tion has struck one either as stilted or in some way failing to sound as it ought. A reader must beware, on the other hand, that he does not attribute life- lessness to book conversations out of his own mind. That is, he must be sure that the book talk really is lifeless, not that it just sounds unnatural to him. There is a great deal of difference. In this the saving thing is reading experience. Just as there is experience in life, so there is experience in reading. Not every one who picks up a book is a born reader, by any means. No doubt today there are more poor readers than ever before in history, simply because there are more readers. It is a mathematical world, after all. T Natural conversation flows out of the lives of the characters. It would deem easy, but it isn't. Any one may prove this statement for himself by trying his hand at it. Just attempt to write a short story, that is all. Get a plot all you please, even get a good plot, a great deal yet remains to be done. Making characters act naturally, above all, talk naturally, is a gift No doubt more persons possess this gift today than ever before, which may or may not compensate for the fact that there are more poor readers than ever. It will be found that a certain stiff- ness actually lies in words, in attempt- STARS, MEN and, ing to make characters talk as if they were real characters. ‘The words creak, just as actions creak in some stories. Some fiction writers, knowing their in- adequacy in this regard, adopt a plan of making most of their characters do a great dezl more thinking than talking. Marcel Proust, the Frenchman, was one who carried this to great lengths. If you have never tried a whirl at Proust, you ought to do so, just to see how an author who is labeled “great” by some readers can get away with this device. * K X K Poor conversation, in fiction of all types, especially in novels, arises from an inadequate understanding on the part of the author of his own creations. Mere glibness and number of words does not make conversation natural. The novelist has to be so full of his characters that their talk flows. It cannot help flowing out of their lives, because the writer knows them from A to Z, and all the way back again. Any average reader can understand this in a novel, although he himself could not do it. That is what he likes about a good story, that some one else can do it. Sometimes characters run away from their authors. Perhaps these are the best characters of all and their ordinary talk the most natural conversation in the book. They even may say things the author had no idea they were capable of saying! One does not have to be a novelist, in any sense, to grasp this. We have said that there are many poor readers and there are, but the salvation of the twofold process of writing and reading is that there are many good readers, too. Whitman said: “Give us great readers,” but just good readers are enough. They will be the first to catch the spark of reality in good conversation, well handled, adequate, zestful. Aok A What a charm there is, after all, in | book conversation! One may feel, after many years of novel reading, of short-story reading, | that the talk therein is the best part | of any story. because it is at once action, character and theme. Everything in a story comes out in the ordinary conversation of the char- acters. In this, stage and novel are one. Stilted, belabored talk, talk which does | not ring true, conversation which be- numbs the reader as no doubt it does the cther characters in a tale—these are some of the marks of a fiction writer who understands neither his characters nor his job enough. Often one reads a story in which a large use of modern slang and the like | is expected to make up for slight glimpsing of the characters by their | creator. This fools only the newcomer to the world of books. The old hand, who has read good “book talk” from many lands, in novels new and old, refuses to be stampeded. Slang and cursing cannot take the place of common sense and ideas. Even when characters talk in “high- flqwn language,” as the old phrase had it, as real people never talk, there yet may be the saving grace of fitness, which has carried many a book through to universal triumph. Good readers accept or reject fiction | more on conversation than any other one point, perhaps. This is as it should | be, for what is more human, after all, than talk? AND ATOMS Notebook of Science Progress in Field, Laboratory and Study. BY THOMAS R. HENRY. ‘The ghost of a gruesome joke s rising from its grave after 70 years to plague archeologists. Supposedly interred in oblivion after years of bitter controversy branded as the grim horseplay of a drunken saloon- keeper, the Calaveras skull of Bret Harte’s poem may be resurrected as a highly respectable fossil. Such, at least, is the intimation of Dr. John C. Merriam, president of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, who has been interested in the problem for many years and has traced down some of the stories concerning it in connection with the problem of early man in America. The joke, one of the most famous perpetrated in America. may turn out to have been on the jokers. * X % X Back in 1866 the theory of evolution | was new and shocking. 4 To some the Darwinian suggestion that man might have been derived from an apelike ancestry was sacrilegious, but to others it was highly amusing and anybody who talked about it seriously was considered rather eccentric. At that time, during the gold rush i days, there was a crowd of jolly good fellows in the little settlement of Bald Hill, Calaveras County, Calif. There was also a rather eccentric, choleric doctor named Jones. He had read Darwin and thought there might be something to the idea. He used to putter around the hills in his spare | time, picking up old Indian skulls. When he talked about it in the saloon it seemed very funny to the mine operator, the storekeeper and the saloon- keeper. The latter, it so happened, was in rather chronic ill health. He indulged liberally in his own wares. The doctor himself enjoyed an occasional joke. He did not hesitate, so the story goes, to give his patient medicine for his hang- overs, the purpose of which was only incidentally curative. The angry patient wanted to pay the doctor back in kind. One day, so the story runs, a way occured to him while he was sitting over his cups with the miner and storekeeper. The saloonkeeper—according to one version and there are several—picked up an old Indian skull, put it in a burlap bag, and sent it around to Dr. Jones’ house with his compliments and the story that the miner had just found it at the bottom of a shaft 130 feet deep. Some said it had been under the counter of the store for some time. Several days later, according to the story one Bald Hill resident told years later when the incident had become of wide interest, Dr. Jones was seen to open his front door, cursing violently and throw the skull into the street. “That —,” he was quoted as saying, “told me this came from the bottom of e shaft and here I find cobwebs But later the skull was retrieved, perhaps by the doctor himself and it was lying around the settlement a year later when Prof. Whitney, State geologist of California, stopped there. it and took they could finish. They had to stick to their story—and whatever the truth about the specimen may have been it certainly was not contained in the account they gave. &8 One of the most eminent American geologists of the day was Clarence King | | quently of the United States Geological Survey. It so happened he was a mych better | geologist than anthropologist. When he examined the skull he lent the weight of his authority to its genuine- ness as a true antique. If the story of its finding had been true it certainly would have been very | remarkable, indeed—by far the oldest human specimen ever found. It would according to the geological evidence. It was, in fact, a very curious skull, but not exactly primitive. It finally was deposited in the Peabody Museum of Harvard University. The claims for the Calaveras skull were demolished, largely through the painstaking work of the late Dr. William H. Holmes of the United States National Museum. He was aided by other an- thropologists who were opposed to the thesis that any very ancient men had lived in the New World. They went over the ground with great care and proved rather conclusively that if the skull ever had been in the bottom of the mine shaft it had been | thrown there, probably as a joke. Local | residents furnished affidavits as to the circumstances, which varied widely in detail. The anthropologists supposed that it had been picked up from an old Indian burial ground nearby and was the skull of a modern Indian. But, Dr. Merriam now believes, if the relic was planted in the shaft by a crowd of jolly good fellows having some good clean fun at the expense of the choleric old doctor, they made the mistake of picking up the one skull which really was anciert and that they obtained it from a nearby cave. “It has been the privilege of the writer,” says Dr. Merriam, “to follow many of the stories through a long and difficult route which has led to ex- planations not easily obtained by earlier investigators. The skull, which was thought by some to have been taken from an Indian burial ground and placed in the mine as a joke, now appears to have come from & cave de- posit, perhaps of considerable age. Nu- merous artifacts, supposed to have been obtained in the auriferous gravels, now are known to have been washed to the places where they were found by large- scale operations of hydraulic mining. “The fact that the Calaveras skull occurrence, put forward with such care by leading scientists, seemed to be dis- credited may have had influence in making it appear that other occurrences, especially of flint implements assumed to come from ice age deposits, were also untrustworthy. It may not be too much to say that Bret Harte’s poem had real influence in retarding advance of knowledge relative to the antiquity of man. the story of this skull was more complicated than we assumed, and it now seems that the general record of man's presence over America is also a more difficult problem for investigation than appeared originally.” Lighten the Load. Prom the Indianapolis News. Maybe the Milwaukee inventor who says that having a million dollars is a burden could invent something to lessen the strain. a ANSWERS TO QUESTIONS By Frederic ]. Haskin, A reader can get the answer to any question of fact by writing The Washing- ton Evening Star Information Bureau, Frederic J. Haskin, Director, Washing- ton, D.C. Please inclose stamp for reply, Q. Is there a probubility that the rules for contract bridge will be amended soon?—B. L. A. The sponsors of the international laws for 1935 stated that there would be ;\o further changes for at least five ears, Q. How many voting precincts are there in the United States?—J. H. A. Mr. Byron Price, manager of the Washington office of the Assoclated Press, says that their report for 1934 showed 120,187 voting precincts in the entire country. He calls attention to the variations in the meaning of the term “voting precinct,” some States vot- ing by districts, others by counties, units and towns, Q. Is it true that an air-conditioned room affords relief to a person suffering from hay fever?—L. F. A. It is said that the filters which are used in air-conditioning systems remove the firritating pollens which cause dis- tress to hay fever sufferers. Q. Can mail carriers smoke while de- livering mail?>—C. R. W. A. They are npt supposed to smoke while on duty on their routes. Q. Several times here of late T have seen mention of “the short and ugly word” used by Theodore Roosevelt. Will you be so kind as to tell me what it was?—P. M. C. A. The word referred to is “liar.® Q. Is the World Peace Foundation an incorporated society?—M. E. A. It is incorporated under the laws of Massachusetts governing educational and philanthropic institutions. It was founded in 1910 by Edwin Ginn and its primary objective is to make readily available actual facts concerning inter- national relations. Q. When were cloth bookbindings first used?—A. 8. A. It was not until 1820 that cloth was introduced as a covering, invented, it is said, by Archibald Leighton, one of the most successful London binders. Q. How many Catholics are there in China?—E. R. A. There are approximately 2,624,166 Cathelics in that country. Q. What is a spread with reference to newsapers?—E. R. A. A lead story and all its subsidiaries constitute a spread; also a story that requires a top head, that is, one that goes at the top of a column; also some- times used to designate the head itself. Q. How long did it take Keats to com- plete his “Ode to a Nightingale”?—E. F. A. Halleck says: “In the first Spring after Keats met Fanny Brawne, he wrote in less than three hours his won- derful ‘Ode to a Nightingale’ while he was sitting in the garden of his home at Wentworth Place, Hampstead, listen- ing to the song of the bird.” Q. What is a “Blue Nose"?—R. W. A. A popular nickname for a native of Nova Scotia, from the effect of the climate or from a potato called Blue Nose raised in that region. Q. How are pine-needle pillows made? A Thev are generally made of balsam. The needles are picked green and stripped. They made be dried a little before placing in the inner lining of cambric, or they may be put in before drying. In stripping the needles only the short tips are reserved for the pil- low. The pillow should be ghaken fre- and the needles thoroughly mixed. Popular sizes for these pillows are 7x11 inches and 11x13 inches. Q. What is the size of the smallest violin that has been made3—N. C. A. The Etude says that’ the smallest violins are those made by Heberleib of Germany. They are 13 inches long and | weight about one-sixteenth of an ounce. have dated back beyond the ice ages, | The The heads and pegs are of ebony and the G strings are made of silver wire. Q. What is the B'nai Brith?—J. J. J. A. The phrase is Hebrew for Sons of the Covenant. It is a Jewish fraternity which was founded in New York City in 1843, and now extends over the United States, various European countries, Pal- estine and Egypt. Members are ad- mitted without regard to dogma and | ceremonial custom. Q. How wide is the Atlantic City Boardwalk?—J. C. A. In its central portion it is 60 feet wide. Throughout much of its length it is 40 feet wide and at no point less than 20 feet. Q. What is a Gunter’s chain?—W. P. A. A surveyor's chain, invented by E. G. Gunter, British astronomer. It is 66 feet long and divided into 100 links, each 792 inches long. Q. How many executions took place in the United States last year?—E. R. A. A. There were 198. Of these, 86 were white and 112 colored prisoners, Q. Who were the parents of Richard Mansfield?—T. F. A. His mother was Mme. Rudersdorff, the singer, and his father was Maurice Mansfield, a London wine merchant. A Rhyme at Twilight By Gertrude Brooke Hamilton Late Summer Dusk The midnight was divine, with d=% so deep That every hill and valley seemed to sleep. The nowexs dewy and the verdure green, And over all a firmament serene, From whose blue depths a million stars shone down, Softening the overlighted streets of town. The dawn of day was glory; every cloud Emerged in radiance from its nightly shroud. The flowers lifted faces to the East, As if the orb of day were some high priest. A fresh breeze blew the leaves down, one by one, And birds poured forth their matins to the sun. The dusk came, rainy; heavy clouds hung low, And in the town chill winds began to blow. But I cared not if skies were gray or blue, For evening brought me firelight—and o .