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HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Herald, 1924-09-11, Page 2MRI.Mn...+r,.n1.!.w+Y-f'n.^'11^..+.!r'-.•m....-.^r•.--w.. ....-...wrr�...l ..... Village Plays and Pageants Sometimes it seems to me that the Ian, Duteh or German immigrants Impulse ter play acting, like sun livor-' would be suggested by wagons loaded ship or devil dancing - or singing, is; with household goods and the building deeply seated among the primitive in of a log cabin. stinets. Certainly you evils find the . Dances in native ccstur e would fol desire to paint up and perform in some low, and folk songs, accompanied in Fanner "before e, wondering public the old-fashioned way with a fiddle or among all races and in every remotest an 'accordion; and an early wedding Hack wind corner of the world. land merrymaking, perhaps interrupt - Among. our own people the impulse ed by a call to arms at the beginning, appears to be stranger in the villagesof the war of 1812. and along any healthy countryside A pageant, whether there are to be than in the cities. Perhaps thisis be- spoken words or not, must be fully cause the, country children are thrown planned and written. But you don't ioi fullyo n their own resources for need literary folk for that, Every via u e u ei amusement. The city dweller, I am lags houses. certain thoughtful persons, sure, weakens in the faculty of honest young or old, who love the place and self-expression as commercialized di- its history. There is usually a teach- versions. multiply around hills. er or a librarian somewhere near who And' then, of course, he seldom can can help. The planning is vastly more Itnow the joys of doing fairy plays in important than the writing. and that a big old barn; is wholly a matter of study, thought The villages I have known—and, and sense. West and East, they are many—have Yes., by all means create your own always simply erupted amateur plays. pageant. Stick to your own history, I can't recall a little -farming centre" of your own ideas, your own faith. Make a thousand . or so population that It a local effort, draft in everybody to hadn't some sort of hall over the gen- help, and you will find your neighbor- eral store or the emprium with some hood flowering cn your hands. sort of stage at one end of it and us- In selecting the ground for the pag- wally some sort of footlights, scenery eant keep in mind two important re - and otherequipment for theatricals. For play acting is fun, and of a very busy healthy sort. You can'tcast and rehearse a play, advertise it and present it in business- like fashion for a night or two, with- out drawing heavily on whatever in- telligence and imagination may be evi- dent or latent in the community. There must be organization and co- operation and a kind of daring. No village undertaking that I know of so sharply lifts people out of routine into a degree of excitement, and none is so sure a solvent of cliques. Capable Leadership. I.can hardly imagine a village from which a few young men and women haven't gone up to a university only to discover that playwrighting, stage decoration and acting are now ebjects of sober study a.nd practice. Many of these scatter homeward every year', fired witb. a new enthusiasm. The home magazines have recog- nized the movement by publishing many new plays with instructions for inexpensive staging. There is hardly a normal s,clueol or high school to -day in which you will not find some bright young teacher who has designed a stage setting or two or picked up some knoweedge of sketching costuraes and of the effec- tive use of colors. The agricultural colleges are at it. With thi,s. widespread. racy ardent le le no longer neceasary. . It is hard to think of a play that ecan't be pres.ented better in simple draperies than in erudely painted old - I fashioned sets,. ; Lighting is no longer a serious, prob- lain; any bright boy with a hunch at wiring a motor or setting up a radio outfit can quickly grasp the simpler Interesting playe can be presented with. dignity and charm on a platform in a schoolroom. Of one truth I am convinced: There is consid.erable talent in any sraall community, particularly among the young people. There is plenty of it on farms, anywhere. Hunt out that talent, develop it, let , native enthuslastn find a healthy out- let, and you will soon be in the way of building an organization of which your community will have reason to be I know of no more stimulating com- munity activity. It is a clean, busy, Stirring sort of recrea,tion, and there 13efore going into the many interest- ing problems that arise in pregenting plays indoors--problera.s of selection or tbe pla.y, casting, rehearsing, pre- paring the stage, and so on. ---it will perhaps be timely to touch on outdoor plays and pageants. A pageant, as the term is now un- derstood., is a series of. historical or symbolical episodes designed to recall the growth of a eomrautity, or of an art of induatry, or of an idea,. They usually are enacted in eauto- mime, without spoken words, though there la music and. there may be danc- ing and singing. But to me the most iateresting are those that are prepared wholly within a, village or a neighborhood to cele -i brate some important local anniver- sary or event. I saw a few years ago such a home -1, Made pageant a small village that ; depicted in fasehiating episodes and touchee of allegory the history of the I quaint eld settlement from earliest times, when the primeval forest knew! only the hunts and danees of the In - thanes through the, landing of the wbite discovereta from England, original treety tor the land, the life and dee- gers of those filet settlers, the Indian wars, and tea clown to to -day. I It was a prettettleus undertaking that called ot. the servieee of hundreds of persons' within a, 'radius of many dealing with tate early tlags of sonie foam Ontaria tvery Region ilas Ka Color. quirements—a fairly wide place for the action, preferably beside a river or pond, as you niay wish to show the Indians in their canoes,'and somewhat masked by trees; and room for the audience to sit. - If you can find a natural stage area beneath a sloping hillside you are for- tunate, for then your audience will be hY?»lYYpv `'y SY/+`.`'Yai Y''.,..,a' asesee .. see eeesees• erica""" 't?!*;,7. Oft The world to -day awaits a benefac- tor such as it,•lias never before ltnown; one who will deliver' it from the great- est scourge ,of ii11 time—Cancer. It is by far cur most terrible and dreaded disease --compared with it, consump- tion is infinitely lees deadly ---.and 80 fast is it spreading that its victims number millions. In this ccuntry alone, 5,000,000 of the present popula- tion are :doomed to die a lingering death by it. For 'all these sufferers science can do little or uotiilnb. The disease is the despair of all the great medical hinds, and both cause and cure are I absolutely unknown. "It is doubtful,". Sir Arbuthnot Lane, the consulting surgeon to Guy's Hospital, London, re- marks, in an introduction to "Cancer," by Mr, J. Ellis Barker, "whether a cure for cancer will ever be found," A Disease of Civilization. "I, have come to the conclusion," Mr. Barker .writes, "that cancer is pre- ventable and avoidable in the great majority of cases, that it is a disease of . civilization, and that it may be made to decline gradually and to dis- appear altogether as - that fearful scourge,' leprosy, which devastated the world in olden times, In the Middle Ages there were, ,19,000 leper: houses in Europe: Now leprosy has become a rarity. Cancer is the leprosy- of modern civilization. It may never be curable, but it is avoidable." _ greatly within the next few years me- lees some counter measures are adopt- ed, I1 noappropriate steps are taken: for preventing 'cancer, the eencer death -rate in England may rise so greatly that •of the people now living not 5,000,000, but 6,000,000, 7,000;00.0, 8,000,000, may die in torments of that ghastly disease." Cancer, he adds, is almost exolusive- ly a disease of advanced age, because it takes so many years for the poison. to assert itself; also, instead of a blow often being the cause of cancer, it is more likely it merely accelerated a disease which Would have made itself manifest in any case. Some doctors are' almost distracted by the haunting fear of cancer. A good many medical men 'have connnittd suicide when at. tacked by cancer and some have ap- parently ended their lives merely ow- ing to the unfounded fear of having the disease. One of themost extraordinary, fea- tures of cancer is that it stribes down rather the strong and :the well-to-do than the weak and the poor, who are more likely to contract consumption. It is not infectious, . nor is it heredi- Elson McKay, Canadian cyclist.chainpion in the quarter and half mile distances, taking a sprint around the Scarbpro Beach bowl with Katty McRae, one of the dominion's most promising lady riders, The Forest Ranger. Should you meet a man with a face of tan With a stetson that's sunburned and worn, On a jet black mare with her head, in And a gun on the saddle horn. A man with a quirt and a buckskin shirt, - Whose breeches are tidy and trim, able to look on in comfort from the in A man beguiled by the lure of the wild, cline. And the sight of the world from the Building a large enough stand for an rim, audience is expensive business and is seldom necessary, Outdoor Plays.. Outdoor plays have in summer and early fall a charm all their own, They are simpler _ than pageants, calling for a smaller stage and much less in the way of organisation. Often there are pleasant old -private grounds With a look in his we sort of never - say -die . And a poise that is bred of the air; With. a back just as straight as a five • barred gate And shoulders both thickset and Making Love -Letters Private. There have always -been parents and ;"guardians to hinder and thwart the hapless' lover, and many girls have I bee "obliged to resort to methods of deception. The simplest means ever employed ,was to write the love messages with fresh milk instead of ink. On the r:e- ceit of a blank sheet -of paper, all the recipient needed to do was to sprinkle it with soot or charcoal. The grit stuck to the lines traced by the pen. When .the trick: was of no avail, 'chemists would perforin the task of writing` with, acetic acid. Another chemis applied eulphuretted hydrogen gas + to the letter and the secret was un- . folded. Another "sympathetic" ink isthat produced from cobalt, the writing 'of • which disappears in the cold, but ap- i pears again •as often as one cheeses f after being exposed to a moderate de - in a village that will gladly be loaned His deep furrowed brow bearing wit- gree of heat. !br the purpose. If not, there is al- Hess to how 1 Characters written in diluted sul-: most always a grove or a field within He's fought against storm and the phuric acid and lemon -juice become reach. cold, j black or brown; those written in solu- It is well in selecting outdoor bills And his manner is mild—'tis the spell tions of nitrate and chloride of cobalt to avoid realistic modern plays ca;Iling . of the wild and of chloride of copper are rendered for indoor scenery and furniture. If On the student who dwells in its fold.I green, the color disappearing when the you need to suggest a' rear wall simply a paper is allowed to cool in a moist run a cord or wire between two trees Should you. ,meet ,on .the trail he will place. and hang cambric or Canton flannel j give you a hail, with openings for doors and windows. - Composition board, roughly painted, may be used to suggesthouse. square; And ask in.a casual way, Faithful Mother Seal. The questions, oftcial•�your name and A sea -captain not long ago'captur"ed In the author's• opinion, cancer is caused by chemical poisoning; tar workers are poisoned by the poison in ,the tar; it is the same with oil work- ers, aniline workers, etc, We are poisoned • with fumes from tar ,and petrol,smeiling roads—for petrol—also may be a contributory factor. In can- cer—but the most powerful source of poisoning is the preservatives In food. Also, we do not eat sufficient coarse foods. "The cancer death -rate in England and in other advanced countries," Mr. Barker writes, "is likely to rise very tary. A shortage of vitamines in the body affords .another opening for cancer, and the only way to ..overcome this is by consuming less sugar and eating mord wholemeal bread, green vege- tables,.'and fresh fruits. Sugar is a thoroughly dangerous food;" Therefore, to .escape cancer we should carefully avoid chronic poisoning and vitamine starvation. To avoid` poisoning we should avoid that state to remedy which so many people em- ploy strong purgatives. To` avoid vita - mine starvation we should, avoid all substitutes for wholesome natural food, however tempting they may look and however strongly they may be re- commended to us.' Patent foods and patent medicines are equally danger- ous. Mr. Ellis Barker's book is a valu- able and timely contribution to medi- cal science. Snapshots of Sounds. A new invention of Professor Four- nier d'Albe has made it possible to photograph sounds. Professor d'Albe is the inventor of the apparatus by which a blind man can read a book, the printed letters reflecting light on to a selenium call, which produces sounds by electricity, so that the person really reads by •sound. - The new instrument is called a tong-. a initial ede e. It consists of a trumpet, of Costumes are very effective -out- Obje-ctive; duration and stay. a young seal, hoping, to tame and rear P n , ma • , l't .,. 'hoard' hi He' lay it in a which the end Is horizontal;' the dears„ and ca be de most .imp y I 1 l i � •, th ...;end is stretched a shoot of thin tub motionless, 'without .rico the te' s brew- out f h The I And Rhi h i d of 'digester; is Much more important than the ma- ing soon d 'swiftly as the ship s er1 en the mother was as swift and Th light lam is Hector the road followed in search of het- young When : edecteci from the mercury on to a ter. The Murder Car. Alone, save for a dot of white The wide road lay in the morning light A low, soft . purring on the air, ; A. long, black monster now gliding there Along the road, turns frons its way, Springs• for the dot as a cat for its . prey, And' Mary's pet Leghorn move again "What does it matter? hen." will ne'et lt's� only a ls p• p_. o cheap materials. eco oriug, then ck se,ure it, but ,w e s hint of coming, 'thout ;ocean wasp an ' ', bei, •on w c . s a rep, mercury. ' sas er " The invite is warm and sincere, P e from an electric P ec or watches for his mss terials or the cut: He—"My doctor advised me to take lots of air." She -"Dad's no doctor, but he told me to give you the air, too." And he- thaws in' a flash with wr the t �hotographic plate, and any sound Now of relatives. and friends bereft bacon and mash, it was first caught, ht the mother howled P He's a host that is full of good cheer, piteously, and the "baby" carcked spoken or sunlit'° n the trumpet/flakes The collie dog is all he has• left, b kit ief; but the man was re -the mercury vibrate, a "pattern of the A sudden roar, a pitiful moan, acs gr Then you sit round the fire and youlentless, and woolly watched the agon- broken reflections being produced on And Poor old Hector lay dying, eloper the plate. never will tire To listen with silence and awe, To tales that are strange of forest and range ' Of aimals wild and their lore; ized mother follow` him 'till, the ship reached the wharf at Santa Barbara. Here lie tbought his prize was safe, ;for` surely no seal would venture there, and 'tile ' ship was docked. , Suddenly the mother gave a cry close to the To talk that is quiet of havoc and riot, ship, and the little one, as if obeying By Sorest fire; landslip, and flood, instructions, struggled,. still in the Of strong silent men who left human sack, to the edge of the deck, and roll. ken, - led Mel! overboard. The mother was With. the call of the wild in their seen to seize the sack, ;rip it open with blood; her sharp teeth, and joyfully claim he baby. She• had swum after it for eighty miles. A Poem You Ought to Know. • A Song of Sunrise. Probably the most magnificent des- cription of the coming of day is the. prologue to Robert Browning's "Pippa Passes." Browning is often accused of obscurity, but here is directness and force, and the splendor of the language matches the splendor of the dawn. Day l Faster and more_fast, O'er night's brim, day boils at last; Boils, pure gold, o'er the clouts -cup's brim Where spurting and suppressed it lay, For not a froth -flake touched the rim Of yonder gap in the solid grey Of the eastern cloud, an hoar away; But forth one wavelet, • then, another, curled, Till the whole sunrise, not to be sup- prest, Rose, reddened, and its seething breast Flickered in bounds, grew gold, then overflowed the world. An Improved Telescope.. A. telescope has been invented which, although only five inches long, will magnify four -and -a -half times. Such largo magnification, combined with a Short focal length, has been achieved by improved lens grinding and perfect mounting. The border' of prismatic color in most expensive field glasses has been avoided by a new combination of•glass- es and the arrangement of apertures. The glass contains a concave -convex flint ,objective lens with a double con- vex crown and a double concave flint eye -piece. An Apple a Day. Men the doctor arrived he found the patient in tears. "Cheer up, my geed man," he said, „you'll pull through all right" " 'Tisn% that, lade," groaned the pa- tient, "but just think of the money I've spent buying apples to keep you away," 'Tile oborlginal Ionians 'would figure of course, Then we would see the hardy i'roneh missionaries or fur. traders, .Incidents in tlle•lives -of the white settlers would be shown, We would see the rod -shirts(, bat pygo- lttaky lunmernlen in their camps. The incoming of Swedish, 'or Veg- With a parting grip and a friendly tip, He swings to his waiting mount, And canters away, for his work won't stay, Tho days of a ranger :must count; The trail calls you on so you journey along, Through a country to which you're a stranger, With, a hope in your breast that some- where in the West You'll meet once again with the Ranger. =Frank Miell, Nordegg, Alta. Animals Killed Wholesale.' During the recent hcof-and-mouth plague in California the nurnber of ani- mals slaughtered in some places was so great that natural canyons and abandoned railway cuts were used as burial places for the mass of carcases, the: earth sides being: blown in with dynamite. Britain's War widows have been de- creased by 90,000 who have married again. 1 - True Majesty. I love the sense -of power that a horse Bred to rude service—some great Nor- mandy Or Percheron teeming with strength and force - Gives to me as he pulls' so easily r His mighty load along the city . street. His bashing eyes, wide nostrils., toss- ing mane, • The shaggy fetlocks dangling round his feet, : His surety of movement, show his I grain - And mettle, as'unflinchingly each day He serves mankind; and when I thus { behold This nobleTitan marching on his way With such true majesty, my head I •• hold I-Iigher a bit, step livelier through the crowd And with new sense of power am en dewed. These patterns are quite distinctive. The mote B flat gives a different pat- tern from the note F; intact, the drop of mercury follows every variation of musicsung or played into the trumpet, so that a moving band of photographic -film would .record voice or music as a ,series of -different patterns. .. • We thus have a new instrument for the'study of speech and sound, which may pave the way to fresh knowledge and perhaps find many good uses, With savage joy runs the wild road hog, "What does it matter? It's only a dog.,,. To Observe Sun Spots. A very small telescope or even an ordinary field, glass or opera :glass,: will afford the reader a view of sun spots at a time of solar activity. The safest way to observe them is to point the instrument at the sun and focus the eyepiece until a sharp image of its disk, several inches in diameter ,is projecte'd on a surface of smooth white cardboard held at a distance of from two to four feet. The spots can easily:; be distinguished from specks on the 1 eyepiece by .noticing that they move with the sun's image. At present we are just emerging from a period of solar calm during.which no spots have. been seen for Weeks at a time. But a new cycle of activity has already be- gp g g' to appear. The reader hardly needs to be warned that if he wishes. to look directly with his telescope, field glass or opera glass he must protect his eyes with the blackest of smoked Blass Will Raise Price. Mother—"Silence is golden. Wil- lie, not silver, as you say." Willie—"I'm glad to hear that -sis- ter has never given `lire-more'n a quar- ter, you know." Speckled. Trout In Maritime Provinces, The fish cultural operations carried on by the Department of Marine and Fisheries have been almost entirely in the interests of the most valuable com- mercial food fishes. The demand for speckled trout has, -however, increased in recent years in the Maritime Pro. vinces, and with a view to meeting • this demand, 700,000 speckled trout eggs were obtained early in the yeas' from the state of New Hampshire and 1,200,000 have been secured from coin merelal''ish farms in the United States. These eggs have been distributed • amongst. the yarlous hatcheries in the Maritime Provinces, un and a few s ots are be ronin —Louella C Poole I as the intensely bright image would • otherwise seriously injure them. Y' engineer of Ontario, to enable Kitchener to convey supplies to I:,)eo,,Cd with the aid of J. I,, T:lrawer, 1)fi1Ci;y6 c,ii., i y is clese to the resent disturbance In Khartum in attempting to rescue Gordon, this'bi�idge over the Atbara river p the Slidell. An Object Lesson. A certain sea captain and his chief engineer, tired of endlessly debating which the ship could more easily dis- pense with, decided to swap places for a Clay. The chief ascended to the bridge and the ,skipper dived into the engine -room. After a couple of hours, the captain suddenly 'appeared on deck covered With oil and soot, and generally the worse for wear, "Chiefs" he called, wildly :beclroning. with a monkey wretch. "You'll have to tome down here' at once. 1 can't seem to make her go." "OC course, you can't," said the chief, calmly removing his pipe from his mouth. "She's a,shere," - Mcchenical Berk Clerks. Machines which sort money into the various d.enoinivatis, and count it, are likely . to revolutionize banking methods. Tho 7iootei)ays, British Columbia, aro the principel source of 811:0 in Cnn- oda, There ere wvorkebbe d pooits at Notre 1)aino des singes, tilts in the Ciat'm penineu7e, Quehieed;