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Home My WebLink AboutThe Brussels Post, 1955-09-14, Page 7Never, as far 'back as I can remember, have I seen so many people looking so completely whacked out as. during this sum- mer. With the prolonged heat, of course. Those who are not red and perspiring are white and listless, after many nights 'of restless, or little sleep, And ap- parently people are the same wherever you go-town, country Or lakeshore-inoffices, stores, 'factories, farms and homes. Houses may be insulated and protected. from the hot glare of the sun but little can be, done against the humidity It seeps in everywhere - dampens your clothes, the bed-linen, walls and furniture. Outside there often,,, seems to be a nice breeze New- % Mg but humidity comes with the breeze. And the remedy? Keep wale- Mg and forget about it - flocs heat, the humidity and all Wet goes with it. Brave words - and of course most of us keep on working. But forget that it's hot -that's another story. lace1 /4 ever, it may be some consolation to realize that in Ontario' we are, all in the dame boat and that grumbling absorbs more energy than acceptance There used to be r, philosophic expression, that was popular many years ago. In times of stress people would say --"Oh well, there's worse trou- bles at sea." That was in the days when shipping hazards were L:r greater than they are now. Today we might well say - ,"There's worse troubles in the States." When we hear of Penn- sylvania and four of the other States devastated by such ter- rible floods, we immediately think how little we have to grumble about. The heat will pass and if it is all we have to contend with we should be thankful indeed'. I suppose, instead of com- plaining, we should concentrate on making working conditions as painless as nossbile for those abOut us and to give a thought to the dumb creatures that hap- pen to be our responsibility. It is easy to be short-tempered and "take it out" on those with whom we work or live; to insist on perfection at a time when per- fection is practically impossible. And what of the . animals-the cOws left out in a shadeless pas- ture exposed to • the merciless sun. Shade cannot suddenly be provided in fields where there are ncetrees but surely the barn- yard could be left open during the heat of the day. Cattle will always make for` a shady spot, even if it is only the lee-side Of a building. That was something I noticed when bying from Mon- MERRY MENAGERIE treal to Malton Airport-certain sections of the country that were so ruthlessly neat and tidy. No hedgerows, very few trees, cat- tle pasturing in wire-fenced fields. And how much shade does a wire fence give? Then we have our domestic animals, Have they access to drinking water at all times? Even a cat likes water in, hot weather, Are dogs tied, up Un- necessarily or confined in a place without shade? Our latest clog - Rusty - came from a six- roomed house in a new sub-di- vision. The reason his former owner let him go was because, except for an exercises period during the evening, the dog had to be kept either tied, up outside or shut up in the house, Mostly he was in the house. He is a big clog and it was during the first hot spell the people realized it would be impossible to keep him. He was getting bigger all the time, inclined to be cross under confinement, and at odd times when he broke loose the neighbours complained - and • probably with reason. Now Rusty has the run of the farm and is proving to be a good watch dog, He is very rarely tied up, and is quite easy for us to handle, but he won't allow strangers to take any liberties. I am sure he must be much hap- pier than he would ever have been in a sub-division. His for- ' mer owners were doing a kind- ness' in letting him go. If only there were more like them, A small house and lot is no place for a big dog. Not in Ontario, anyway. In England it is a dif- ferent matter. Over there doge don't have to be tied up, It must surely be a canine paradise! Every second family seems to own a dog but in spite of ...the fact that confinement le not legally necessary the dogs seem to be very much under control. Of course they have fraternity gatherings on the street, and oc- casionally like to bury a bone in a neighbour's garden, but since so many people keep dogs there is little complaining. Per- haps one reason why the dogs give so little trouble is because most of them have 'good pedi- grees. Naturally a person own- ing a well-bred dog isn't 'going to take chances on having it hurt or stolen. As a result it is properly trained, fed and cared for. Speaking of creatures of the animal' world I hear the Lon- don (Ontario) district has been invaded by large insects called "the Praying. Mantis"; a preda-' Cory insect that destroys many of our more injurious pests. I have always been attracted by the Praying .Mantis. It has an in- teresting history which includes legends and superstitions eman- ating from the ancient reeks, who thought it possessed super- natural powers. It made its first appearance in Ontario in 1914- its numbers have increased con- siderably since that date, AUSTRALIA'S "WIRE I gravely doubt whether wo- men. were ,ever married by cap- ture. I think they 'pretended to be; as they do still. -G. K. CHESTERTON Time for work-yet take Much holiday for art's and friendship's sake. -GEORGE JAMES DE WILDE insult to their fine jail to inw, gine that a prisoner could Atop his way out with that? Oulf after abject apology was Nor- rond freed, His reputation as an easy mark, he says, spread a Stubble fire, and the Hohernians ganged up on him. One arty couple froThi Boston made the nights bideouS with revelry and threatened him with a brick when he bawled his protests up the stair well, He hired waterfront goo nip tO throw them out after they'd pinched the Milkman's horse and dragged 'him up three stee flights of stairs to their studs to serve as model for. Genet. Sherman's charger. Then there was Stefanos O'- Toole, who kept a live sheep in his bathtub, ready for the Greek Easter rites; a little Dutch vio- linist who kept his late wife's ashes in a coffee-can on the mantelpiece but had lost the lid, so they •became heavily adulterated with cigarette stubs; a bootlegger (main sources of supply the Atlantic liner stew- ards) who made a lot of money, lost it in the crash, and ended. up as bartender in a Third Ave- nue beer joint where he swelled his salary by manipulating the cash register, a pastime he called "playin chunes on the. Jewish pyeanner." Two strapping young men with bronze badges and blue- black automatics came for hint one day, and lie winked at Ney- roud. as they marched him off, presumably for fourteen years at least. An hour later, however, he was back. "Them feds was a couple crazy kids," he said. "Wanted to play it straight..Held me while they knocked off a load of Scotch I was bringing in off the frog boat. Wouldn't 'listen when I told 'em I got it all fixed with the office. Now I gotta buy the stuff back from the feds." He then 'phoned Prohibition H.Q. to protest the double-cross and negotiate re-purchase, but didn't get it, back because those "crazy kids" were hijackers impersonating federal agents! The difference between a hu- man being -ten years of age and one fifty years of age lies alto- gether in the matter of toys. -AUSTIN O'MALLEY About "Pricilla" The Lovable Goose Minions who watch the Ed Sullivan television show were amazed at the lifelike actions of "PrisCilia" the goose that acted as a "stooge" for Max Bygrave, the English comedian, Writing in "Answers" Jack Kenrick tells about Priscilla's "insides" - better known to his friends as Harry Cranley. * Priscilla is certainly uncan- nily realistic,' and it is ack- nowledged in the theatre world that Harry Cranley has no rival within miles of him. Although he makes all types of animals for other perform- ers, Harry sticks to the 'goose for himself. He has done it for fourteen years now, and he has really got it down to a fine art. "You can get more 'out of a goose than any other, animal," he told me. "Horses, donkeys, and others of that ilk are ex- cellent for comedy, but the goose is 'the most expressive and human of them all." Harry, five feet,, six and a half inches tall, is the tallest animal manipulator in the business, and Priscilla, of course, is tailor-made to fit him. But it is an acutely uncomfort- able affair, all the same. Harry is, doubled down to three feet all the time he is inside the skin, and it is sweltering hot. His line of vision is less than two and a• half feet, and it Is almost impossible for him to see where he is going On the stage. He has to feel his way about, but he also has a pretty good mental picture of the stage set- ting. He never rehearses in the costume, and can therefore memorise his way about. But things do go wrong, of course. When appearing in Man- chester one year,- he was chas- ing the Squire up a rostrum, and when turning round to make his return he mistook his footing. Plunging over three feet, he crashed into a lamp and hurt himself so badly that he was coveredwith blood. The children in the audience cried out when they saw him fall, but, of course, they couldn't see the blood. Larry carried on in acute agony, but he had to be put on his feet first. "When I do fall over," he ex- plained, "I can't possibly get up on my own. Whoever's on the stage with me has to help me 'up again. Most actors, of course, react quickly. Harry's most embarrassing ex- perience was when he and one or two other members of the cast Went out of the theatre during the interval while play- ing at Luton, They misjudged the time, and Harry was almost due on the stage when they got back, He broke all records in mak- ing the change( and he always has to remove his street clothes first bedause he works Only in a singlet and trunks), He Wad- , died on to the stage in the nick of time, and then suddenly real- ised_that he had forgotten to put the webbed feet On. was complete except, that a pair of very human-looking Socks OUtt "It meant," Harry says, "that I had to crouch down very low all the time, so that I could hide the feet from the audience: thought my back was going to break before the scent was over,' It often feels to him, even atter fourteen years of the work, as though his back is going to break. That is the worst part of his job. Apart from that, and the heat, Harry loves it. "In fact," he assures me.' "I almost forget that I am a hu- man being once I get on the stage. I seem to take over Pris- cilla's personality completely. I think and feel just as if I were the goose herself, and, believe me, when she is crying, I really am crying underneath the skin." He ' has six strings to mani- pulate when he is on the stage. Two of them are for the eyes, two are for the wings, one is for the tail, and one is for the beak. Remembering which ones = to pull at the right time called for a lot of concentration at first, but Harry manipulates them in- stinctively by now. Priscilla talks, and Harry has developed a special goose voice of, his own. It's something of a combination of its own voice and Donald Duck's. More than once, as a matter of fact, he has been referred to as being in the same class as Donald. Harry inherited this animal impersonation act from his fa- ther, who donned various ani- mal skins for pantomines for almost half a century. Harry himself began on the stage as a straight comedian, but he help- ed his father to make the ani- mal skins, and gradually be- came so interested that he eventually took over the Pris- cilla guise. Now he is so closely asso- ciated with the goose that he is booked up for years ahead. Next Christmas season, ter instance, he will be at Coventry, and the following year he will be at Manchester. And negotiations are already in hand for his 1958- 59 season, which will probably be at Dudley. He does occasional other work during the summer (he has a small acting part as well as the Priscilla role i n "Charley. Moon," for instance), but he, finds that his time is fully oc- cupied with making skins for other performers. And Priscilla has to be re- made every' year. The actual frame lasts about five or six years, but every summer it has to be covered with new material and fresh feathers. They are genuine goose feath- ers, too. Cleaned and bleached, every one is sewn on by hand. They overlap to a depth of four to five inches, and, in all, 3 lb, of feathers are used. Harry has never worked out exactly how long the job takes. He completes it over a space of three or four months, and it's a labour of love as much asvany- thing else, And Harry, of course, has a nickname. He is known to everyone, including his own family (he has a son and daugh- ter), as "Goosie." WHO WON? Starlings were a source of real annoyance to Mr. W. S. Carpen- ter, of Xeritucky. He has man- aged to scare them away from his home, but victory WaS a costly one, His double-barrelled shcitgnn went off prematurely as he closed the breeeh while prePar, ing to lire at them from an Up- stairs window. The shot played havoc with water pipes running round the room; the escaping Water Cascading down the stairs leaked through the floor and ceiling to rooms below. Mrs. Carpenter, believing' her' husband had shot himself, cot- lapsed and had to be taken to Hospital ler treatment, Queer People Who Do Queer Things There are some queer people in the world. 'Almost every day there are news items in the press about someone who has something no one else has. Take the case of. Madame Fag- not, of Montparnasse, Paris. 'For years she lived a normal life, looking after a hoMe, cooking meals, seeing to 'the children, going to the cinema, and was no different from • anyone else. Then suddenly-she is unique. One day she noticed that the flowers in a vase in the room were almost dead. She took them out of the vase and then some- thing else suddenly attracted her attention and she left them lying .on the table. / When she came back the flow- ers were blooming. She • Was quite sure thy had been dead but, seeing them in full bloom, she thought she must have been mistaken. She was riot so sure two weeks later when the same flowers were still blooming! She took some fish from her refrigerator and then forgot all about it. For three days it lay where she had"left it. They were three very hOt. "days and the fish should hale begun to putre- fy. It didn't. It was still fresh. She has made other experiments with witnesses p r e n t, and whatever she touches remains fresh for an unlimited period. Tainted food does not become fresh again, but dying flowers and plants revive at her touch. It was during the war that the extraordinary gift of Otto Zillich, waiter •in a Nuretnberg hotel, first showed itself, One evening during the war, 'When every place was heavily blacked out, Otto was crossing the' fore- court of the hotel with his hands full of electric light bulbs. Suddenly, there was a shout from an air-raid warden: "Put that light out!" It was only then that Otto realized that his, fingers were touching the terminals of one bulb-and it was alight! Otto was still in Nuretiiberg when the Allies Marched in, and the first thing he did was to show them how he' could light up an electric bulb with his fingers. Pieter Jaarsveld, of Bloemfon- tein, South Africa, hit the Afri-, can headlines recently because of his ability to sense oil deposits and coal Veins underground. He needs no apparatus, but knows from a definite tingling in his body when he is standing over oil or coal. Then there was the case of Argettesilla de la Cerda of Ma- drid. He could not see through brick walls or' through front doors, but he could examine With ease the content§ of a safe With a steel door. Ile could see through any Metal as' easily as if it Wasn't there. X-ray specialists frotri Spain and England discovered that he could see through silver y gold and platinum plates •as Well as Steel and ikon. ut net One Of them could offer any Satisfactory explatIdtidh. Prom the Obit 'of view of Moralk life scenes to, be divided into two periodsI in the first We indulge, in the secondWepreach. ROLLING DOWN TO HELLS GATE Where the mighty Fraser River beds through narrow canyon$-,,'Bell's Gate on its way was to the sea, the CaticiPliein National Railway's crack Soper Continental slows doWii 'five.itille-ari-hour Speed: Fish ladders have been built to enable the salmon' to surmount 'dl tuck-frill and proceed up river 'to SpieWii, the silver-Sided hornecOmers ate plainly seen making their way up the tirt4iclial staircase near the point Where the was nidde. Cave oweners Dragged Herae. Up Three Flights of Stairs - Tales. .0 a Screwball Rooming Nouse ••••,•'!",, • Peel). in the heart of Israel is a settlement of former cave dwellers who came from Tripoli five years ago to .414.1c0 new life for themselves, „,. There are 140, families in• poi- Plt, the .settleinent, The men make their living -farming,. while ,• the women weave .1nagnificein " rugs which are sold.. in New., York and Washiogten; • . - Two women from the. settie merit have recently' been to Washington to show' they weave the rugs. - Thp elder, et them, Mrs. Henna, Hagog, PO-tad . never before been . on a planet and spoke ',only Arabic, The Miss, Mazal Hassan, 18, is engaged .to be „married. The American imMigration authorities wanted. to •• -knew where the. women had lived -for.. the last ten' years. -When,. OK they had lived in,.a ,eave,in. Tri- poli they wepteci,to,iskiew,,,the street and the nu,mber! • The two _rug', WeaverS Staieed!s.' with Mr: Reuven . the. Israeli Minister They , were both taken to the White House. to. •present, a. rug to Mrs. Eisenhower. , At ,first • they weren't sure they wanted to go. But Mr. SlillOah' 'explained" to them that Mrs. Eisenhower. was the wife of the President'of the United States. Mrs, asked asked what a President was. Mr, Shiloah explained he was like a governor-general. Mrs, Hagog said she did not under- stand why she should make a rug for the President's wife. If she was going to make it for, anybody, she would make it for the President. IIRO$ICLE °P6IINGERFARM P, ClaAe . tip • -£s•,•,;'•$4,Z Householders who think ten, ants can be queer folk should try running a rooming house in the United States, Gerry Ney- roud, a Hritisb, journalist, who has lived there thirty years, once did so on New York's Low, er East Side. Hie first tenant was an old German music professor who moved into the ground, floor with four grand pianos, five bull fiddles, two 'big and four little drums, some huge curly brass horns and a "cloudful of harps," He then had a large wooden sign fixed over Mr. Neyroud's lovely red front door announc- ing; Music Museum. World's Greatest Collection, Instruments of all Ages. Demonstrations Hourly. Admission One Dollar. It was quite a job evicting the old gent, who'd spent all his money retrieving the instru- ments from storage and had rionevto pay for removing them, Neither had Neyroud, so the ground floor was inoperative for two months, Eventually transferring his playthings to a new museum in Long Island City, he left Ney- roud as a memento a French horn he didn't need. "I haff no more devind to blow him," he explained. It was used to play the "Wed- ding March" - rousing indig- nant complaint from a young man upstairs who was sleeping off a hangover - when a mid- dle-aged couple, newly-wed, took the professor's rooms. Another tenant (public ac- countant) paid a month in ad- vance, but took umbrage when, six weeks later, Neyroud hinted that he was behind schedule. He'd want a substantial rent de- duction, he said, if he were to stay: the flat was altogether too depressing. "See what I mean," he said, asking him in. Neyroud found the floor and walls painted black. From dark purple door to littered desk, clutte r e d kitchenette, dish strewn dining-table, tumbled studio couch, and up the wall and halfway across, the ceiling were flesh-pink rubber foot prints. "Who did' this?" Neyroud ailced "I did," said the tenant. "After all, when in Rome you know . . . ." His next tenants, Neyroud says in a book abounding in laughs-"Americans Are People" -were a young couple who did batik work (the printing of coloured designs on textiles by waxing parts not to be dyed) and choked his plumbing out- let by pouring melted wax into bowls, basin and bathtuh. The repairs cost him the two months' rent they paid in four months' tenancy. Then came an engaging young gent who was carted off to ali- mony jail before he'd paid any rent at all. When he telephoned asking for some necessities, Ney- roud packed a suit-case, adding "as a cheery piece of symbolism" a slice of stale bread on a rusty, almost toothless hacksaw blade, and handed it to two scowling jailers. Early next morning he was called for and himself carted off to the jail. Laid out on a desk before the two grim jailers was a jailbreaker's outfit consisting of the hacksaw blade (minus its bread) two nail files, manicure scissors and a packet of safety- razor blades. Did he admit, they asked, smuggling these instruments to a prisoner? Did he know that aiding and abetting a jailbreaker was a criminal offence? Evident- ly it was the rusty hacksaw blade that rankled. Wasn't it an ONE'YEAR LATER - A new hurricane-prosfe' oC eple stands atop historic Old ;North Church in Boston, one year after Hurricane Carol toppled the old one to the ground. The new steeple is an exact replica of the'original one from which Paul Revere got the lantern signal for his famed ride during Revolutionary War. MERRY MENAGERIE "Well, there's no Taw against ME being apavy Crockett fan!" Upsidedown to Prevent Peeking a 1 a 5 A. 3 3 A 3 A 1 a a -1 nis 0 5 A n IN NO 00 I "I d a at 1 Vv o A 2t1 S a N ti 0 ON o d N M ON 0 I O 3 A s d 31 3 N A 1 a 3 080.3V1 Vt'sZ, :1‘1 ,42:1 I J. V N 0 9 a a "I wouldn't mind his stnolilng if he'd just stop that ea'16 rou- tine!" 7.1-lesistecl adthority s. Photographi bath 9. Camel's hale cloth Rubbish 11. Finial on a pagoda 17.13kg..511.0 0 ell 12. Front 22, Sprite 23, „Harmless 21. Destiny 26. Beards of grain 06. American IndlanS CROSSWORD PUZZLE 27. Outdoor game e 25, Comelier 31. Pronoun 30. Head covering 31, Bury 38, 1Citten 40. CHVG inforMation 41. Voldanic matter 42. Server 53.1301.thaer 41,1?alm leaf 15, Born 40, Driglish letter,., PS-t: Antlered animal n2, Depend 51, Utter.DON .1. 1100 t u ran t 2, Tncllgo Plant 3, Anodyne 4, Walked 5. Arder 5, Auricle ACIIQS4 3.Nelses-. making device 4, 1001101 8. 80011 12 literary fraguiPh to 18 \\Ingo 14, 1,VoodWind. instrument 15. nirergreen tree 10. 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