Evening Republican, Volume 15, Number 228, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 September 1911 — Page 3

Five Per Cent Commission

MtoMaggie Raines and her mother rircssr They had talked all there was to talk. iTbey had tears In their eyes as they talked. * -r'-Vv'C,'; > v ... For a year past Maggie had had a •steady place as a stenographer at fl 2 per week, and she had done wonders with her salary; rent, fuel, provisions, clothing and car fare, and they did not owe a dollar. ffThe average working girl is twice the financier that the average Working man is. Things had gone very well with the little family, but now trouble had come. Maggie had lost her plaoe at a day’s notice. She wasn’t despairing, hut discouraged. She knew all about answering advertisements and tramping from office to office. It might be weeks before she was settled again, and what of the income? - Down at the corner where the girl had taken the car every morning and [left it every evening, was a real estate office. The proprietor was a mid-die-aged man, and he loqked to be a good man. That is, he seemed to •Maggie to have an honest face, and she thought there might be sympathy there for one in trouble. She didn’t want charity, and she didn’t want pity. .[She Wanted a chance to help herself, ijust as it would be given to a young •nan. “W$l?” queried the mother after a long silence. . “I was wondering if I was as smart as most other girls,” was the reply. “One of our stenographers quit her place two months ago and went to selling real estate on commission. She has made a hundred dollars a week." • “Just think of that, Maggie!",. / , “I am thinking of it In the morning I am going down to have a talk with the real estate man on the corner. If I can make |25 a week it will !be a great thing." “But how does any one sell real estate, dear?" y "I don’t exactly know, but I guess most of it is done by talk. You make a person think he wants to buy, and then keep at him until he does buy.” “Well, you have a coaxing way about you. You got the landlord to come down five dollars a month oh the rent, and the grocer will sell you * pound of prunes a cent cheaper than ihe will me." , ■ Next morning Maggie Raines visited the real estate office. Mr. Stryker •had Just opened his mail and seemed [perturbed, but he gave her his attenjtion. In an embarrassed way, and yet (With underlying confidence, she said she believed she could sell real estate, jahd She wanted a chance to try. Mr. jStryker didn’t smile doubtfully nor sarcastically. He had been trying to hell real estate for a good many years, [and had had poor luck at It, but he didn’t even ask himself how a young stenographer who didn’t know the lvalue of a load of sand was going to ■make a success at it He gave* a minute or two to thought and then replied:

“I will give you a chance, and a splendid one. I own 80 acres of timber land at Walnut Point, on Lake Huron. I have about closed a deal with a party In Buffalo. In fact, the deed Is made, out, and If handed to him the money would be passed.'* "And are you going there to close the deal ?’’ Miss Maggie asked. , "I was, but my wife has been taken seriously 111 and I cannot leave her; I can give you power of attorney and sand you, if you can go this evening and close the affair tomorrow. I will pay your expenses and give you five per cent commission. You will net 1860 for three days' work." “Oh, Mr. Stryker, but that’s too much —altogether too much,” exclaimed the astonished girt *TU be glad to go for f 50.” "Your comlmssion will be the sum 1 have named. You will take along the deeds and a letter, from me. You will, of course, say that you are connected with this office. You can say that other parties are after the land. If asked about my standing you can say it Is of the highest You can say that on a part of the land ,1s a quarry of purest granite that when developed will be worth twenty times my asking price for the land. I have been told that the walnut trees alone on the land are worth half the price, and yon can mention, that incidentally. You must talk. Miss Raines—you must talk.” "I certainly will." "And bring back a certified check tor the amount. Make the party understand that he is getting the bargain of his life, and that I am selling more to accommodate him than for any other reason. John D. Rockefeller Would snap'up Walnut Point in a minute at the price asked, but 1 have refused to deal with him. You may hate seen him here at the door of the office the other day. You had beet be ready to take the four o’clock train.” There whs rejoicing hi the house •r Raines. The eale was sure to go through and that SB6O would solve many probleme. It would be a starter for other sales, and after a bit Mlse Maggie might be riding around to her own auto to hunt up customers. She . rode sll night, but she didn't sleep e wink. Over and over—a hundred times over—she repeated her lemon, and after her arrival and breakfast in Buffalo she sought the office of Mr. Oeorgs McLane with the utmost oon-

By LAWRENCE ALFRED CLAY

(Copyright, isu. hr Associated Literary PrsssJ

Adenre Shat hadn't haan tnM whether UUvUvQa flftUfl KJUVaI Ivlil . ushered into an office where sat a young man of less than twenty-five, who had half a dosen letters from the morning mail before him. No chin whiskers—-no benign! A very keen, good-looking young man she called him, and she suddenly found that she had, temporarily forgotten even her own name. He opened two more letters to give her a chance to get her memory back, and then aha began on her first real estate sale. Yes. Mr. MeLane had had some correspondence with Mr. Stryker about Walnut Point. Yes, he had about decided to close the deal. Yes, he had heard something about that granite, and something about Mr. Rockefeller. Yea, it was very kind of Mr. Stryker to offer Him such a bargain. ' " Miss Maggie Raines was exultant That five per cent commission whs as good as in her purse. She was an unqualified success as a real estate seller. And then Mr. showed her a letter from the west three days old. A part of it read: , “The big storm caused the lake to cut through the Point and make a channel 200 feet wide. The gale did not leave fifty trees standing on the whole tract I know that the old shark Stryker has been written to, and you look out that be don't stick you!" Miss Maggie laid down the letter and then covered her face with her hands and wept “Of course, you didn’t know," said the young man kindly. "Will you—yoti believe I didn’t?" she asked. "I am sure you didn’t Stryker was trying to use you to swindle me. He was afraid to come himself. That’s all fudge about a sick wife." . “And I—l am an Idiot!" she said as her tea rr. came aghln. “Oh, no, no, no! It was five par cent commission, you see. I shall be up your way in a day or two, and may 1 call and talk It over with you?” “But what is there to talk about? Stryker is a villain and Tm—l’m—” But yet when Mr. MeLane called they found lots to talk about, and mother and daughter were glad that he came. Mias Maggie dropped real estate and took up stenography again, and Mr. MeLane — Well, when a young man will make a railroad journey of 40 miles every two weeks in order to spend four hours in the company of a young lady, it is to be concluded that there is something doing, and that Buffalo’s next census will show at least another happy home.

First English Play.

Nicholas Udall’s “Ralph Roisterbolster,” which was printed in 1566, was probably the first English play, and of the second of such oomedies. “Gammer Gurtok’s Needle.” which was performed at Cambridge in the same year. Careful students of' the history of the English drama recognise the Impracticability of drawing distinct lines of separation between the old miracle plays which were religious, the moralities which were transitional, and the plays of the distinctly secular stage. The earliest ascertained date of miraele plays in England is approximately 1110, in the reign of Henry I. At that time the miracle play of St. Catherine was acted at Dunstable. It is mentioned by Matthew Paris under Its Latin name “Ludus de Sancta Katharina” as performed under the direction pf a monk, Geoffrey, who later became abbot of St. Albans. Tbe subject of tbe beginnings of English drama is presented In an Interesting manner in Manley’s “Specimens of the PreShakespearean Drama.”

Europe's First Parrot.

So far as known, the first introduction of parrots Into Europe occurred in the fourth century B. C.. when, it is related, one of tffe generals of Alexander’s army, returning from India, brought with him specimens of the ring-necked parrakeet. These p&rrakeeta, which were called “Alexandrian parrakeets,” after the monarchs in whose reign they were Introduced, are still very popular with bird-fanciers, and are so common in India that sailors continually bring them to Europe and America. They are docile, and while slow in acquiring speech, finally make exoellent talkers. Roman writers Inform us that they were not eaten in India, but were field sacred because of their ability to reproduce human speech.

There Were Others.

A couple were engaged to be married the other day in Chicago, and ev•ry preparation was made to celebrate the nuptials, but the bridegroom did not appear. A messenger, however, brought the news to the waiting party that he had business occupation in New York, and could not leave. The reply of the young lady was worthy of the occasion. With tear-drops glistening in her eyes, and her heart ready to buret with grief, she turned to the company and said: *1 don’t keer a darn, there’s plenty more men In the world, anyhow!” 4 - • ... The first system of polios was inaugurated In England by Sir Robert P*el in 1814. li

SHREWD PROMOTERS FLEECE THE 'GRINGO'

ffifi EXICO savors of romance, I* IB mescal, chili, guitar thumpIWI inga and ® old - ft has about J it the lure of easy money and - swinging hammocks, and there is a popular feeling that fortunes wait for the hustling American who ventures into the land of the Montesumas. . Americans look upon the Mexican as an untutored and childlike individual who cannot compete with Yankee shrewdness. Sooner or later the adveuturous financier of the northern republic ventures across the line into the southern republic and invests in a banana plantation, a dye wood concession or a mine of ineffable richness. / * / i Fleecing the “gringo” has become an established business in those arid lands that lie to the west and the smith of the Rio Grande del Norte. A stream of good American dollars is poured Across the line into the “land of tomorrow.” The Mexican, has taken a leaf from the book of the dead and gone boomers of the old boom towns of the prairies. The recent insurrection has, stimulated business of this sort, but it has been well established for the last decade. “ Fakers Looking for Victims. You can buy anything you may happen to desire among these transient promoters of the 'resources of Old Mexico. They have aped the advertising of the legitimate concerns that are honestly endeavoring to open up certain rich sections of the backward republic. The fact that many colonists well placed and carefully Instructed have made money In the new lands has made business .good for the faker and the swindler who have followed in the steps of the honest promoter. Many of the plausible tongued gentlemen who oome up out of Old Mexico to sell plantations are Americans, sun tanned, saturnine men, with a gift of tongues. The great majority Of them, however, are gentlemen with saddle colored complexions and Castilian accents. They let it be known, that for reasons not unconnected with the disturbed conditions of their homelaud they must sell. Their descriptions of their very grekt plantations roll from practiced tongues. . "?■ : . • r They will sell you anything from a sugar beet plantation to a salt mine or a gold mine. They prefer to deal in those “lost mines,” of which all trace vanished before the revolution of 1838. Some old Indian in their group of family retainers has, so the story goes, recently rediscovered this place of fabulous . richness. The plausible gentleman cannot return, and work this mine. He will be thrown Into Jail or he will be persecuted by his political enemies. Alas, he needs money now, at onoe. He must sell, and he usually does sell. The gold brick has always been a weakness of tbe American. Banana plantations are one of the main standbys of the dark skinned promoter. He always has many pictures. They are photographs erf beautiful banana groves, with himself standing well In the foreground. Big bunches of the fruit are dropping overhis shoulder, and around him are a number of white clad halfbreeds, to whom he refers as his “peons.” His language rises to iridescent heights as Jm describes the “so grand hacienda,” and the vast acres that surround his -home, His tongue fairly drips- gold as he describes the fertile land, the glorious climate and the certainty of a fortune to the lucky man who grasps the providential opportunity.

These gentlemen with the smooth and Versatile manners Invade American cities. They work very cautiously and very quietly among the sort of people who dream of getting rich over night by some lucky speculative turn. They stop at the little out ol the way hotels and tell a tale of persecution that accountu for their secretive movements. Talk for the Invee&r. Ah a rule the swarthy coloring, the Castilian accent and the photographs of the plantations, concessions* rubber groves and banana forests are all that the promoter needs In order t» convince his victims. "Ah, but See, senor," he exclaims, "here is the station of the railway that Is located quite near the hacienda.” As he talks he rifles through s hunch of Mexican photographs, selecting one now and with much to edify his listener. "You will see that there Is transportation for the minerals, the fruits and

the dry stuffs from the plantation. Then, too, senor, the labor is the cheapest. Do you see In this picture the mozos who work for me? Ah, but they. are contented folk, who will work and work hard If properly handled. It is the Senor American who would know how to handle these pa*, tient workers. Dangerous? Not at alt and very temperate.” \ In the southwest they cut thfer eye teeth on such tales and pictures long since. The business of marketing imaginary banana plantations and arid wastes of sand for sugar beet fields has languished there for years, it forced the promoter to penetrate farther northward with his thrilling, entrancing and Iridescent stories of wealth to be had for the asking. Popular ignorance of Mexico has aided them. Our estimate of the Mexican shrewdness has made-the task of the promoter easy. We think that because he cannot speak English fluently he is already delivered into our hands. For years the rubber forests were the sweetest song sung by the singers that came up out of Mexico with luring tales of fortune. The present high price of rubber that has followed the development of the automobile industry will doubtless revive interest in the rubber areas of Old Mexico. The promoter with his' photographs and his heavily stamped credentials, with the red and blue seals will again invade the United States. The Mexican Insurrection has helped him in his campaign against the timid American dollar. It has aroused an almost forgotten Interest in the country of the snake and eagle bam ner. Every one expects development as soon as the muddled situation over the country begins to clear up. People are thinking Mexico and talking Mexico. Their knowledge of what is going on there is at the best half knowledge, and the promoter finds the ground already broken In which he is to sow the / seeds of the lore of easy wealth. The recent troubles make good his story of reverses because of political conditions. He is a sort .of a hero among the suckers whose flames are on his list. They listen open mouthed to his tales of guerrilla warfare and appear to sympathize as he describes his arrest and deportation for political reasons. -

They decide to buy. “Speculation** they call It among their friends and the immediate members of their -famiiiea. Some of the lands that they buy hare been sold hcores of times to different purchasers. Some of the Mexican rubber plantations sold to American investors have been surveyed and found to be out In the gulf somewhere to the north of the Yucatan peninsula. The legitimate exploiters of Mexico have made the presence of this horde of smooth tongued adventurers possible. They are fattening in the publicity given the real schemes of Mexican development.

When He Wants Grapes.

“Champ Clark Is rather leery about giving an opinion nowadays,*’ said one of his friends in the house press gallery. "He Is running for president. He la much given to saying that he will not discuss a subject that everybody else la discussing. “Mr. Clark reminds me of a young lawyer out west The legal light would not oommit himself on any subject Two of his friends, Tom «nd 'John, undertook to make him take a stand. They went to his office and incidentally commenced a debate whether or not a buffalo ate grapes. “*Of course, he eats crapes.’ said Tom. I saw one climb twenty feet into a tree to get a bunch of grapes.* " 'What! A buffalo climb a traef* “Tea/ * 1 " ‘What do yon think of that proposition—a buffalo climbing a tree to get crape*—Judge r said John to the lawyer, who had remained silent up to that time. “ ‘Why, 1 don’t know, but there’s no telling what a buffalo will do when he wants grapes,’ was the reply/*— New York World. r

A Quaint Thought

Miss Geraldine Farrar, seated in her deck chair on the George Washington, regarded a half dosen urcftffipg playing on the sunny deck, and then said, with a pensive smile: T often wonder, considering what charming things children are. where aH the queer old men eome from!"

HOLD GRAVES SACRED

CHINESE ARE EXTRAORDINARILY CAREFUL OF THEIR DEAD. Rsrevence Carried to an Extreme in the Yellow Country—Case In Point Bhows How Obstinate They Can Be. /’ Better strike a Chinaman than step upon his ancestor’s grave. They are finding that out to the great detriment of industry and agriculture all over Cathay—for the Chinaman will simply not allow a railroad or a plow to pass through what he suspects Is the dust of one of his honorable forbears and there is no condemnation law in China to force him to sell the graves. The instance of the Russian railroad from Harbin to- Port Arthur, which made a 26-mile detour to avoid the ancient Manchu tombs at Mukden, has been often cited to show the expense and trouble that may arise from this cause. This was many years ago and there seems'to be a popular idea, even among old foreign residents of China, that the going for the “right of way” men and the builders of railways is much easier now than then. /As a matter of fact, since people are dying right along and the number of graves increasing as a consequence. it is very doubtful if conditions are not becoming worse rather than better. The Chinese nave accepted the railway as a conveniehce in transportation, not as a destroyer of their beloved graves. They have shown the greatest readiness to patronize it once it is built, but they never have ceased, and never will cease, putting obstacles in the way of a line that disturbs so much as a single isolated ancestral resting place.

Many of the foreign educational institutions of China have been years acquiring the land for their ground!— principally on account of graves—and the blue print maps of some of their holdings reminds one of the drawing of the original “gerrymander” congressional district In Massachusetts. The Canton Christian college, in (jtouth China, has a striking monument to the obduracy of a solitary grave-hold-er in the form of an upright cylinder of yellow clay in the middle of Its basketball field. Not the desecrating touch of the feet of the hated “foreign devils,” not the turmoil of the mad games that surge around it, not even the fact that its elevated crest is occasionally utilized by an irreverent student as a coign of vantage from which to toss a goal, hpn led the old woman that owns it to accept the generous offer made her by the college authorities for her little “six feet of soil.” Her husband used to sleep with all the babies crying, she says philosophically,, and it Is hardly likely that a little noise will trouble him now. He will let her know through the .priests when he is disturbed and until then she knows that be will rest better where he Ts. Of course, the obvious thing for the college authorities to do would be to pay a visit to the geomancers and arrange that the old lady should be Instructed that the “fengshul" decreed that her late husband would rest quieter in some other place; but as “subtlety” of this class is hardly In the line of a Christian institution, it is not unlikely that the strange looking cylinder of yellow clay may star the campus basketball field until the gam? old lady is herself numbered with her ancestors. ' }

The New Hydrocycle.

First came the bicycle, with which all are familiar. Next came the motorcycle,' clipping it through the Streets at terrific pace—the power being supplied by a mysterious box under the rider's seat, which gives the machine is name. Now comes an inventor at Oakland, Cal. E. Frey, with a new machine called the hydrocycle, which is a motorcycle designed to ran on water. Mr. Frey has long since won recognition in mechanical con-trivances—-his new gas engine, now in general use, demonstrating the that he is something more than a mere dreamer of dreams. His hydrocycle has three wheels, which are floated by two S lr tanka located in the center of the machine. Rudders for stewing jure attached to the tanks on either side, and are controlled by a small wheel placed between the handle bars. The third or extra wheel la in the rear—the three wheels being In line or tandem. The rider’s seat Is located between the first two wheels, while the third wheel in the rear is supplied with ten paddies on either aide, which extend six lncbea beyond its rim and so reach down Into the water. The hydrocycle is thus a motorcycle, propelled by a third wheel carrying paddles at the stern.

A Devoted Constituent

“That member Of congress says you have voted for him for the last 1# years.’’ # “That's right,” replied Farmer Ooratoasel "You must think a lot of him” “Well, I dunno. You see, 11 yean ago 1 had a couple o' hoss trades with him, an’ stnoe then I’ve anus felt safer with him ■ pendin’ so much of his time In Washington.” .L ilt ’ •' •.¥ • y.i, $ •L'.-.i’ - '-’'ivJrfc.

Importance Recognized.

"Do you think that man fuljy appreciates the Importance of the office to which we have elected hims said one constituent T guess he dose,” replied the other. “The first ihjng he did was to say it ought to command a larger sab ary.”

PARISIAN POLICE "HANG ON"

One American Autofet Found Them Relentless, and Was at Last 1 Glad to Anyone who has ever attempted to fight the police of Paris has been woe.fully defeated, and an American auto* mobilist who has Just made a heroic attempt to resist this powerful instfe tutfon has met his Waterloo Bke all his predecessors. Returning from a drive to the suburbs one day last summer he made a mistake of three liters in the declaration of the amount of petrol in his tank. He refused to P«y the penalty and was taken, handcuffed, to the police depot Proceedings were instituted against him and the refractory automobilist was sentenced to a fine of S2O and costs. Aa an alternative he might choose one month's imprisonment. “I shall go to prison,” he said. Some time passed and he was net molested. He imagined that the police had forgotten all about him. But one morning as he wss coming out of his house two policemen laid their hands on him and took him a second time to the depot, where lie was put in a cell with common criminals. He spent the whole day here and In the evening he was taken with the rest of the prisoners—one of them a notorious apache—to the Sante Jail. The following morning he was offered, the usual pittance in an old prison can, the very sight of which disgusted him, and he refused it, He asked for some food to. be sent to him from the outside and offered to pay, but this favor was refused because, he was told, be was only “transitory” at the prison and no account could be opened for him. He did without the food the whole day and the following morning the same food was offered him and again declined. , > V;

In the afternoon he was put in the dark police omnibus and after hours of Jolting over the rough suburban paved streets he x was landed at Hie general prison at Presnes. Here, on the third day, the common fore wan again offered to him. He was unable to take it and, at last, after a heroic fast .of 72 hours he preferred to pay the fine and costs and was released. The police had Its way and It would be a good lesson to any foreigner who might be tempted in a similar case to protest Better pay any small penalty a! once than to arouse the wrath of the terrible institution that holßs Paris in its grip. . * The Lonely Pope. II Secola of Milan, one of the most considerable papers in Italy, lends its columns approvingly to reproducing from La Perseveranfo an article which describes Pope Plus X as dying In the Vatican from homesickness. In the blistering heat of midsummer Rome he pines for the cooling canals which make his beloved Venice one of the most pleasant of summer, cities. According to this authority, the physicians who have the care of the Pope understand perfectly that If he could leave the Vatican and return to Venice he could easily survive the Ills he labors under, and even greater ones. As for the political consequences of such a removal, the. Feraerveranza’a Rome correspondent says that if tote Pope were to be removed to recover among the old friends where he was so long priest and Bishop, the Government would not regard it as an acceptance of the law of guarantee or as an event of political consequence. "He who would emerge from the Vatican would not be Pope? Pins X, but Joseph Sarto seeking a cure.” .

A Gift for the Editor.

-- - - - • • "The only *ay I purchase stamps these days—and I use a lot of them—is In the little hooks which the government charges yon a cent for/ said a man who writes things for magazines now and then. ’lt will be a . long yme before 1 forget how the last lot of loose stamps got away from me. I bought' |2 worth and after holding them so that the gummy sides wouldn’t meet I carefully placed them In an envelope. It happened that envelop contained a bit of verse that I had prepared a couple of days before and addressed to an editor, but had not sealed, intending to glance over it once more. "Well, I did not look at the stuff after all and, of course, forgot about the stamps and sent the letter off. Shortly afterward the verse came back with the usual regrets. A postscript was attached which read like this: ’P. 8. Don’t bother to send stamps with your next dosen manuscripts. Your credit will be good/ " ... \♦. T' %:¥; £»•■.JBa *MH

Missed.

Senator Penrose, chairman of the committee on finance, said in Washington of a movement he disliked: | "Theso people are oversealous. They, try to do too much. Such people ag»f ways fall. They are like the fnrjMjn grocer who came to Philadelphia. M* got on all right, but, as he lived is m Irish neighborhood, he thought he’d have more success if he changed hi* German accent for an Irish one. He! thought then his Irish would take him for one of themselves. Tt waa a Sunday morning th*t"i» decided to adopt this change. He had set out for a walk, and, a eouple pi Hocks from his shop, he accosted an Irish policeman. *Py labels, officer? he said, ‘gan you dell me dey vay to der Manayunk trolley cars, pwhatr - nr Mill jj y til over, ana anaweraap w* ill fgootf n 4. * || : ‘ ‘intnrePiVTE > : .. ■ Fl , Hi v ' '