Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 98, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 April 1914 — GOOD JOKE ON POLITICIANS [ARTICLE]

GOOD JOKE ON POLITICIANS

French Senators and Deputies Accept" ed Invitations to Attend Centenary of Bogus Author. Life is often stranger than fiction, but that a hoax should be pulled off in cultured and brilliant Paris that surpasses the Ingenious fancy of the clerical playwright who wrote the delightful anglo-Irish farce, “General John Regan”—a play in which, thanks to an American joker, a monument is erected in an Isolated Irish town to a military and political-hero who never existed —is a matter for some surprise. A French newspaper that had doubtless heard of the Irish farce tried the idea on members of the present parliament. It sent & letter to senators and deputies in the name of a “committee” and invited their participation in the grand celebration of the centenary of the “famous author. Hegeslppe Simon,” a specimen of whose profound and winged phrases was given on the note paper. The striking thought was, “When the sun rises, darkness vanishes.” The "committee” offered to furnißh material for appropriate addresses in the memory of the great man. This was enough—more than enough. Fifteen senators and nine deputies —among them ex-cabinet ministers—swallowed the bait. They were so flattered by the Invitation that they promptly accepted, omitting to look into works of reference. Some added tributes to the great thinker and regretted contemporary neglect of him. The paper promptly gave away the hoax, and France is laughing at the humiliated politicians. The moral of the affair is too plain to need pointing out. It is safe to say that politicians who hear of the incident will add some biographical literature to their libraries or- use more care i» the selection of secretaries.