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CHARLES BARNETT
SAWED-OFF SHOT GUNS END
SLOANE'S CAREER
Roy Sloane, who was murdered by
unknown gangsters in New York the
other day, was probably a more typi-
cal young hoodlum than he supposed.
It was his false estimate of his own
abilities which led to his murder, for
it seems probable that it was his at-
tempt to levy some sore of tribute on
speakeasies or bootleggers that
brought about his death. He was
standing in front of a liquor dive
when a car drove up and three men
emptied the contents of sawed-off
shotguns into him. He died shortly
afterward in a hospital, not knowing
who had shot him. There are prob-
ably hundreds of young men whose
careers, so far as these points are
concerned, exactly paralleled that of
Roy Sloane. They grew up, they
grew tough, they grew troublesome,
and now they are dead. But Sloane,
for a time, was almost a public char-
acter. For many months he receiv-
ed a fan mail of which even radio
announcers might not have been
ashamed. Girls wanted to marry him.
Criminals wanted him to undertake
their defence. Idiotic strangers
wanted to meet him and shake his
hand. These letters confirmed
Sloane's notion that he was destined
to be the greatest lawyer in the Unit-
ed States.
But there is little doubt that his
earlier ambition, that of being one
of the most successful motor car
thieves in the United States, was
never quenched; and, since he never
was able to become a lawyer, it is
probable that he will be remembered
by the handful who will remember
him, as an industrious if not alto-
gether successful thief of motor cars.
But he will be longest remem-
bered as a striking illustration of a
criminal who came from a respectable,
even a cultured family, with no
record of eccentric or criminal ances-
try. His father is a former Con•
gregationalist minister. His mother,
divorced from the father, was active
in child wlefare work and is the
author of several hooks. She made a
special study of Indian religions and
philosophies, and would be considered
a highly -educated woman. The son
had a good home and a good educa-
tion and took extension courses of
engineering at Columbia University.
The parents naturally are silent as
to when his first aberrations were
observed.
The police a are less reticent and
say that Roy first came into their
hands when he was 16 years old. It
was for an automobile theft and he
served a sentence in a school of cor-
rection. Three years later he stole
a car in Pittsburgh and was sen-
tenced to from three to six years,
but was released after a short while.
He was picked up in Washington
some time later but the police could
prove nothing against him. A couple
of weeks later he was again arrested,
this time in New Jersey, but again
turned loose. In the same month,
November, 1926, he was charged with
stealing two automobiles in Mount
Vernon and on one of these charges
he was convicted and sentenced to
Sing Sing for five years. Before a
year had passed Sloane had become
a ring leader in an attempted become
and for this was sentenced to an
Magical in its beau-
tifying effect on the
complexion. Soothes
sunburn— a subtle
fragrance gives alluring
clsarm. Try this dainty
toil$t requisite.
At lout druggist
additional seven years. It was after
this that he began toread wherever
law books he could lay his hands on.,
His porings had good effect for it
was not long before he was able to
make out a case for a new trial on
the automobile theft charge. Before
the jury Sloane acted as his own
lawyer and in the witness stand he
convinced the jury that he had been
the victim of a criminal and perfidi-
ous friend who was' the real thief,
This criminal and perfidious friend
never was caught and in view of
Sloane's record it is reasonable to
doubt that he ever will be caught,
unless perhaps in company with Mrs.
Harris. But he had still seven years
to serve for his jail breaking exploit,
and his legal talents were ,,lien con-
centrated upon this problem. He
produced an argument to the effect
that as he had been found not guilty
of the automobile theft he was being
held illegally in Sing Sing and mere-
ly exercised his full right in trying
to escape. It was a bold and ingen-
ious plea, but did snot wholly satisfy
the court, which admitted, however,
that he should have been sentenced
on a charge of misdemeanor for car-
rying brass .kunckles, and not as a
second offender.
The novelty of a convict acting
successfully as his own lawyer won
Sloane a great deal of favorable pub-
licity, it being conveniently forgot-
ten that in any event he was a
criminal who had been in the hands•
of the police again and again,
fairly tried and properly convicted.
When Sloane left Sing Sing he was
given a job reading law in the office
of a New York attorney, who report-
ed later that although he started well
he lacked patience and determination.
That was last December. In Febru-
ary he was caught in an attempted
jewel robbery—an affair cif $5,000
and out of his class. He was out on
bail on this charge when the aveng-
ing shotguns put an end to ambi-
tions of all sorts. Perhaps one of
his last acts was to steal a car for
one was found parked across the
street from the dive where he was
shot and in his pocket was a key
that fitted it. Also in his pocket
were found a driver's license made
out for somebody else, a special po-
liceman's badge and a else mous-
tache, He had told his mother the
day before that he was going out to
get $1,000 which he needed for hie
defence and that when the case was
disposed of the two of them would
leave New York and make a frSii
start in life.
.
GEN. PERSHINGJUDGED BY ONE
OF HIS PEERS
It has long been acknowledged that
what is said is of small importance
compared with who says it. For in-
stance there would be a difference
in value in the opinion eicpressed by
a member of the College of Car-
dinals and a Grand Orange Lodge,
the subject being either the Pope
or the Protestant Succession. So it
is with the verdicts .pronounced upon
military men. The value of those
opinions depends wholly upon the
competence to judge of those who
offer them. That is why, although
we have already given our views on
the subject of General Pershing's, re-
miniscences, we do not regard them
as absolutely closing the subject.
Now when one better, entitled to be
heard comes along we are glad to
listen to what he has to say. In this
case the critic is Captain B. H. Lid-
dell Hart, one of the foremost of liv-
ing military authorities. Probably
nobody has read more of the volum-
inous output of post war memoirs ;
and we think nobody is better entitled
to assess them. We are confirmed in'
this opinion because Captain Hart ad-
mits that they are nearly. all dull and
misleading.
.General Persbing's book, while it
does not fly so impudently in the
face of ascertained facts as Foch's
memoirs, errs just as gravely by ig-
noring inconvenient facts. It is not
so vainglorious as "Sir Douglas
Haigh's Command" which gave the
.impression that Haigh was never
wrong and that he won the war
almost single-handed. But since
Haig did not write the book, the
blame descends not upon him but up-
on his private secretary. Inconcsist-
ency is another manifest failing in
the Pershing opus. In one place he
blames the American War Depart-
ment for incompetency, and in an-
other blames the British and French
authorities for not doing the chores
which properly belonged to Washing-
ton. As Captain ,Hart says in the
New York Times: "The reader is ap-
parently to assume that American or-
ganization was naturally incompetent,
but that as soon as any part of it
passed under Pershingls, !control. a
miracle happened and it became per-
fect. This suggestion seems rather
extreme either way."
He briefly reviews the admissions
of the American general, among them
being that when the United States
entered the war the army had fewer
than 1,500 machine guns of varying
type. In 1916 Congress had voted
$12;000,000 for machine guns but the
War Department had been unable to
,decide what kind to buy. There were
only 35 officers who could fly; there
were 55 airplanes, and of these 51
were obsolete or obsolescent. No
heavy artillery which was up to date
'had been adopted. The French came
to the rescue here. Even until the
end of the war "no guns of American
manufacture of the main types used
were fired in battle." Mortars were
almost entirely obtained from the
British. Because of the delay in
building cantonments it was nearly
six months before the training of the
American army was under way. Some
of Pershing^s criticisms are childish,
For example, he appears to have been
full of the idea that the French were
obsessed with the idea of defensive
warfare, and had been that way since
the Franco-Prussian war. Says Cap-
tain Hart, "In actual fact no army in
history had been so obsessed with the
offensive. It had dominated• their
thought for a generation, and to this
obsession can be traced the disasters
which befell them in 1914. Even then
their reluctance to modify it led them
to the terrible holocausts of 1915, 1916
end 1917 when they shattered them-
selves vainly against the trench bar-
rier."
The reason Pershing found them
on the defensive was that they had
fought themselves to a state of col-
lapse by the other method. Pershing's
great idea was to train an array
which would drive the enemy out
into the open, and when at last he
had the opportunity of putting the
theory into practice upon the Ger-
mans, morally and Physically ex-
hausted, it took him a month to gain
an objective which he had expected
to reach in 24 hours. The Meuse -
Argonne offensive of the American
army would; have been another
"S,omm,e" or "Niroelle massacre," but
for the fact that it was launched in
the Autumn of 1918. Capt. Hart
notes that in the general allied of-
fensive which began on Sept. 26, 1916,
Pershing formed the right pincer and
Haigh the left, By Nov. 11, Pershing
had taken 26,000 prisoners while Haig
had taken 100,000 besides advancing
nearly twice as far. Captain Hart
sets this down to the greater experi-
ence of the armies under Haig.
But the most important decision
that Pershing was to make was to
wait until the American army was
practically full grown, and equipped
in every department before permit-
ting its real weight to be thrown
against Germany. Perhaps President
Wilson was as much to blame for this
as Pershing, although we cannot
doubt that if Pershing had been as
sagacious as he was determined he
e would have recommend to Wilson a
different course and it would have
been followed. As matters were, he
would not permit his army to be
used to fill the gaps in the allied
ranks. If his idea was to build up a
tremendously powerful American
army his course was the right one.
If it was to end the war as quickly
as possible it was the wrong one. In
our review of Pershing's book we said
that his attitude prolonged the war.
Captain Hart says: "If it did not
prolong the war it undoubtedly pro.
,longed the strain on the French and
British and increased the drain on
life." It is '-not, therefore, the part
of British or French to praise his
handling of the American artily.
SAVING THE DAY
Joan was newly married and her
husband was away on a short trip.
"I shouldn't be so silly, but I am
lonely," admitted Joan. "If Mum
were -only here!" Then came the
idea of telephoning. A good chat
with mother over Long Distance—
and Joan felt like a new person.
WHEN BOSS TWEED LOOTED
' NEW YORK
Now that New York citizens are
organizing to make an attack upon
Tammany Hall, they are being inflam-
ed and incited by the stories of other
Tammany scandals and successful
public risings to end them. The most
celebrated was undoubtedly that
which is recalled by the name of Boss
Tweed. This man was probably the
most brazen and successful buccaneer
who ever looted a modern state or
city. For a period of twenty years
he pillaged almost at wall. Because
of the slack bookkeeping methods
employed, it is impossible to get any
idea of the extent of his plunder. The
lowest estimate sets it at $30,000,000,
the highest at $200,000,000. It is
known that when exposure seemed
imminent Tweed offered the New
York Times $5,000,000 to discontinue
its attacks and Nast, the cartoonist,
$500.000 if he would leave the coun-
try and pursue his art studies in Eur-
ope. Both offers were refused.
'But it was neither the paper nor
the cartoonist that finally laid Tweed
low. It is possible, even probable,
that he could have continued to defy
them, as he had defied other critics
and enemies in the past, if it had not
been for a rift in the loot, so to
speak; in other words, a quarrel
among the thieves. Thus was born
the informer who went to the Times
with sensational information. This
was published serially and made
about the most exciting reading the
people of New York had had for a
generation. Other crooks saw a
chance to save themselves by giving
evidence against their acicomplices,
and in a short time Tweed was left
alone to face his accusers. An up-
rising at the polls followed, and Tam-
many receivedthe worst defeat in its
whollL history, only one seat in the
council being retained, that of Tweed
himself, whose grateful poor remain-
ed loyal to him.
William Marcy Tweed came of
honest, thrifty Scots folk who had
lived' in the United States for many
years. He himself was neither thrif-
ty nor honest. Itis father was an
industrious chair .maker, and handed
over his business to his two sons.
But it went bankrupt because Wil -
re 'used
Wilt his time Banging xa ee with
the Volunteer Fire Irl-partinient.
These volunteer fire companies' head-
quarters, sinee they were. Ike,"
where men congregated) Were- po Pangs'
cal centres, and Bill Tweed obtained:
his first 'knowledge of New York pole -
ties Ecom' the volunteer firemen,"and
similar ruffians. The firemen had a
bad name, for it was more than sees
pee ed that they set places on fire in,
order to have the excitement of ex-
tinguishing the flames, and that they
assaulted rival comipanies in their
efforts to be first at the scene of
a fire, and also the scene of the loot-
ing that was ail too common. In-
deed it was the evil reputation of
the volunteers that told • against
Tweed when he first ran for office
in 1851. He concluded that he had
better choose some more respectable
companions and quit the volunteers.
On his• next attempt he was elected
alderman, and began the career that
has became a 'byword for depravity
and corruption.
He began to collect graft almost
from the first, and as .. here was
plenty of it to be had ough the
sale of city franchises it ' _ '= cant long
until he was a comparatively wealthy
man. Gradually he advanced • in the
Tammany organization until he be-
came Grand Sachem. Then he formed
his ring, which included besides him-
self, A. Oakey Hall, the mayor; Peter
B. Sweeney, city chamberlain, and
Richard B, Connolly, controller. Fur-
ther to protect chem they elected two
judges, George G. Barnard and Albert
Cardozo. As an additional safeguard
they appointed a city auditor, known
to be corrupt and in the hands of the
ring. The scheme of plunder was
simplicity itself. Everybody who
sold anything to the city was instruct-
ed to raise the bills, and hand over
the extra money to Tweed or one of
his representatives. The plunder was
then divided with Tweed taking 25
per cent., Connolly, 20 per cent.,
Sweeney, 10 per cent., and Hall, 5
per cent., the rest presumably going
to Tammany. If the contractors were
not willing to do this they received
no more contracts. But few of them
had any qualms, for they were per-
mitted to charge whatever they lik-
ed so long as the ring received its
share.
Under this system the court house
was built at a cost of $12,000,000.
Later on when some of the items
came to be scrutinized it was found
that there was an entry of $41,746
for awnings and an items of $41,190
for "brooms, etc," The surae of $541,-
594 was presumably paid for plaster-
ing the walls, but before the job was
finished the contracting plasterer re-
quired $1,294,684 to repair what he
had done. In 1866 the voices of
Henry Ward Beecher and the eccen-
tric "Citizen" Train were raised
against Tweed, and the taxpayers
noted that their taxes had risen
from $36,000,000 in 1869 to $97,000,-
000 in 1871. There were angry cries
but Tweed induced some of the lead-
ing citizens, including such men as
John Jacob Astor, to issue a reas-
suring financial statement. Later it
was discovered that these gentlemen
paid no taxes. The trouble came
rather abruptly in 1871 when Jimmy
O'Brien, the sheriff, wanted the
Board of Audit to pass bills which he
had padded by $250,000. The ring
thought that this was too much for
the sheriff and refused. He planned
vengeance, and watching his oppor-
tunity went to the Times with the
damning documents which destroyed
Tammany Hall—for a few months.
ENGLISH AND SPORT AS SEEN
BY AMERICAN
By special request we have been
glancing through Price Collier's Eng-
land and the English, published in
1909, with special reference to a
chapter on sport. Mr. Collier is, or
was—is, we hope—an American who
travelled widely and his acquaintance
with the English people seems to
have been acquired through frequent
personal contacts which extended
over many years. He writes with dis-
cernment, but with cordiality, and on
the whole is to be listed as a friendly
critic, aware of shortcomings, but
equipped to discount them. We won-
der how many such books written
before the war could be read now by
the authors without a blush? We
doubt if the England Mr, Collier saw
and loved exists any more. ,01 course,
we do not suppose that English char-
acter—if anything essentially and
actuallly\ English in the way of char-
acter ever existed has ceased to be.
But habits, have changed. Points of
view have changed still more. The
things for which Englishmen were
heartily praised a generation ago are
not precisely the things for which
they would welcome, praise to=day.
For example, we doubt if any but the
infantile and the senile would think
it complimentary to be told that
their nation was more addicted to
sport than any other nation in the
world.
Much therefore of what Mr. Col-
lier has written will be of interest
mainly to historians of the Victorian
era. But he makes some shrewd re-
marks on the' subject of sport and
some that we have never hear be-
fore. To our mind the .most inter-
esting things he says is in his
comparison of British with American
sports. The comparison is altogether
in favor of the British. What he
wrote then is probably less true to-
day; but it is at leas partly. The
difference and super, sty of British
sport over American sport, or any
other Boort for that matter, is that
it is not wholly or mainly controlled
by boys. It is controlled mainly
by adults. More than any other peo-
ple in the world, the English not
only are interested in port but they
have at one time or another pleyed
games. When they leave school they
do not cease to play games. They con-
tinue to play. Moreover, they play
with their sons and their sons' friends.
This is especially true of cricket,
which may\ be held to be the most
English of games.
Upon youngsters who are as likely
as not playing games with either
their fathers or men old enough to be
their fathers thee* is imposed a cer-
tain restraint, a word whieh in this
case we may freely translate as mean-
ing good manners. IUIr.,,,,Colli'el says,
.
xi
el alone, ', : ?l t7i A
OT '$h adult. and aatddleia 4
extent generally ill. 114 4,, upi ttrt
emu . is for the wide viiiferens Mthe ay in which sport is :regarded?
ded?
anda way in which games 'aro'
laved," '`1VIiere boys and youths are
ulatttmed to play their ' games,
erre tet xnyore particularly, with grown
menx: pit ititeeduces an element of so-
briety, ecurtealn, and reticence in their
War 'and Ilyeha'viour' whieh . are lack-
ing to soave ;;extent among boys and
youths who play exclusively among
theme/veal. Cams played in such
'eat/Pic-ions. surroundings assume their
relative place and receive their pro-
per value, for `rieen do not receive de-
feat so keenly nor do they look upon
such victories as the greatest of all
achievements."
This seems. altogether reasonable.
In England games. and sports receive
their status and character from men;
in the 'United States it its from boys
that they receive their status and
character. This fact also ,explains.
the different behaviour of American
and English crowds. In England any
sporting event is likely to have among
the spectators a large element, per-
haps a majority, composed of men
who have themselves competed in
that particular sport, and know its
traditions as well as its fine points.
They are absorbed in watching for
these 'Ane points, and they also feel
themselves charged with the responsi-
bility of maintaining the traditions.
They are not, therefore, so inordi-
nately keen to see a victory. They
are interested mainly in seeing a
game well played according to sound
and venerable precedent.. Outbreaks
on they part of spectators are, there-
fore, rare, although it is to be ad-
mitted that they have occasionally
marred football games played by pro-
fessionals, which are strong attrac-
tions for men and boys who have
never played any game. ' .
Mr. Collier says that the English by
racial inheritance are not belligerent
people, despite the fact that their
earlier sports were of the most bru-
tal kind. Their love of the land is
perhaps their most salient character-
istic, and with this love goes• natur-
ally a love for out -door life. A love
of sport follows almost as inevitably
even if it should take the perverted
turn of the love of the •bptcher who
explained that he was attracted to
his gory calling by his fondness for
animals. There was a time when the
adventurous nature of the English-
man found its outlet in exploring,
and eventually conquering, foreign
countries. When there were no more
worlds to conquer the Britons took to
sport as a means of keeping fit ment-
ally and physically so that they
could retain what they had seized.
With them sport is not a dissipation
for idlers. It is a philosophy of life.
-One good thing about it, as Mr. Col-
lier' points out, is that this philo-
sophy tends to save the British
Isles from becoming the fecund
mother of quack religions.
CHINA'S PERRENNIALLY
UNEMPLOYED
China has no unemployment prob-
lem, and yet China has more unem-
ployed men than any other nation on
the globe. Long ago China's unem-
ployed banded together. Their answer
to the perennial unemployment situa-
tion is organized mendicancy.
As far back as the days of the Sung
Dynasty the beggars had a collective
voice in civic affairs. When a certain
emperor paved the streets of his capi-
tal, they made themselves vocal. "No
longer," they complained, "can we lie
down in the warm, soft dust." And
gradually the povement slabs were
carried away to become the founda-
tions of houses, the coping of fish-
ponds, the paths of private gardens.
So that to -day the beggars have their
Second Cloak, the mantle of gray dust
in which they huddle.
In New York, a few days ago, an
ill-favored main stationed himself near
the door of an exclusive shop, and ex-
tended a begging hand upon which
ugly red splotches were visible. Trade
fell away sharply till the proprietor
gave the beggar a fee to decamp. A
thousand years ago Chinese beggars
were working that game.
I saw this method of extortion on
a somewhat larger scale in operation
in Peking. The shop owner had evi-
dently refused to pay the Beggars
Guild its usual protection money; for
suddenly before the doors appeared
a mob of China's unfortunates: the
halt, the lame, the blind. Each whined
his appeal and displayed deformities.
A Chinese gentleman who was about
to enter the shop instinctively turned
aside. He gathered his skirts meticu-
lously away from those hands; he
averted his bland, moon-shaped coun-
tenance. And, with a sudden sharp
flick of the wrist, he unfurled a paper
fan and held it before his face—to
signify, of course, that he was in-
visible.
This pantomnne took place a score
of times during the afternoon till a
man emerged from the shop with a
bag that clinkedl. The contribution
was handed to the leader of the mob.
The beggars swirled for an instant
about their spokesman and then scur-
ried away to divide the spoils.
It is precisely this_hriats action, di-
rected by the Beggars Guild with al-
ternating 'boldness and strategy, that
makes the mendicants of China al-
most a menace. Certain prerogatives
they always demand. They assume,
for instance, a proprietary interest
in every wedding that takes place. In
the beginning it was undoubtedly a
happy thought that the poor should
share in the festivities attendant up-
on a marriage. To -day it has come to
be a scheme of extortion.
The beggars have devised a uni-
form of green cloth, splashed with
huge white dots encircling patches of
red, which they slip over their rags.
Thus garbed, they march in the wed-
ding procession. It is their privilege
to carry the chests with the bridal
trousseau and gifts. And no article
is ever missing if the guild has re-
beived its feee Elven the bride in her
sedan chair is carried on their shoul-
ders.
A wealthy young Chinese of my ac-
+'quaintanee who had travelled abroad
planned la wedding without these
marchers. The bride was conveyed to
the der'en'iony in an automobile. But
she was unable to enter the com-
aeon
lout
Pl
' taawtba Palin
pound. Before the gate surged, a,masas
of gaunt, starving men. Rims, tshe
hopelessness of argumen or force,
the groom stalked out and paid ,the
mendicants the sumof - while '<,1hey
felt they had been ribbed." •
It is from the ranks of the more or
less able-bodied that the attendants
of weddings and funerals are recruit-
ed. But. in the Beggars G'uil'd,, these'
are outnumbered ;by other, more li-
able specimens: the crippled—or ose
who have purposely maimed t ienx-
selves in order to gain sympathy.
There are schools for the teaching
of beggary, where the applicant --•for
an infinitesimal sum—may learn to
disjoint his legs and ec,me and to
pitch his voice • in the peeper tones.
I knew a Chinese beggar whose
eyes were blinded by eataraets. A
foreign doctor examined, him and of-
fered to operate to remove these im-
pediments to sight. But the beggar
objected, How could he plead for the
few brass cash for his daily needs, if
not by moving people to compassion
by' his affliction?
Occasionally a man whose own
powers of exhibitionism or eapolery
are insufficient, will steal a child from
a country district and bring it into
the city to aid him in begging. The
muscles •of the child's arms and legs
are cut, the growing limbs encased
in a harness so that they beeome mis-
shapen. I once saw one of these chil-
dren crawl toward me on all fours,
dragging his naked, distended belly,
scuttling sidewise in a horrible agil-
ity, so that he resembled a huge spid-
er. From that queer insistent cry of
his, from the speed of his skeletonic
limbs weaving so close to, the earth,
there is no escape, even in recollec-
tion.
Among the beggars who became
well known to the foreign colony in
Peking was a strapping big coolie
with a wide, infectious smile who car-
ried on his back his emaciated, tooth-
less and equally broad -smiling mother.
He sprinted along, able to keep pace
with the fastest moving rickshaw,
extending one grimy hand for alms.
Rarely did he fail to get his, coppers.
During one year, to my certain knowl-
edge, he had three "mothers." And
while he keeps his pace and his con-
vincing smile, I am sure, the supply
of helpless relatives will not give out.
Another of this fleet -footed tribe
was a woman with bound feet and
tiny, .pipestem, atrophied legs, able
to keep within range of a rickshaw
for an incredible distance, In her arms
she lifted a baby suffering from small-
pox—and thrust it at the foreigner.
Whenever this woman appeared, I
stood not on the ceremony of my giv-
ing.
Among China's poor there are all
kinds of mendicants. There are the
conjurers who hover about one's door,
pathetically eager to display their
skill in a coin trick or in the swallow-
ing of a sword. Many of them are so
old that their fingers tremble as they
attempt their sleight-of-hand and
their subterfuges deceive no one.
There are the files of blind musicians
who move through the city lanes at
twilight in their dust gray robes. The
left hand of each man rests upon the
shoulder of the man in front of him;
the leader makes his way slowly, tap-
ping the ground with a staff. Often
they stop to play their bamboo flutes,
their two -stringer fiddles, their ban-
jos of taut python skin. Their music
is weird and sad.
'China has been a land of extremes,
and it is in mendicancy that the ex-
tremes meet. Not many years ago,
when the last of the Manchu rulers
was still in possession of the Dragon
Throne, certain princes of the blood
often crept out of their palaces at
night. They changed their silken
robes to rags; they spattered mud ov-
er their perfumed bodies and sprin-
kled their hair with ashes'. These
princes ranged the lanes, imitating
the beggars' whine. When at last they
tired of the sport, they trooped into
a tea house. They found it hilarious-
ly bizarre—still in their shredded
clothes—to order the most expensive
viands; beche-de-mere, sea -slugs, eggs
pickled in lime and buried. But in the
collapse of the empire many of the
Manchu nobles are begging in earn-
est, turning their talents to amateurs
in mendicancy to the bitter business
of pleading for a handful of rice.
HOUSEHOLD DISCOVERIES
Safety Rinse.
One ounce of alum added to the
final rinsing water of children's
clothes makes them non -inflammable
or so slightly combustible that they
will take fire very slowly and will not
flame.
* * r
To Dry the Inside of Rubber Boots.
To dry the inside of rubber boots,
use common sawdust and make it
hot in a dish in the oven, or in a
shovel on the stove. When heated,
pour it into the rubber 'boots, allow
it to stand for a short time, then
shake it out. It dries the boots
thoroughly in a very short time, and
the sawdust may be kept in a tin and
used over and over again.
This will be found very useful in
households in which the' man of the
house labors at work which causes
him to come home with wet feet.
.a * *
After running tape or elastic in
children's blouses ore pyjamas, tack at
centre back and there are no more lost
tape ends.
• * +.
If baby's woollen garments are
basted on a piece of cheesecloth be-
fore washing, they will keep their
shape beautifully.
* * m.
When storing clothing in boxes or
trunks, make a list of the articles
and fasten to the Iid with a piece of
adhesive. It is very, convenient when
anything is wanted.
3r.
441
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