Evening Republican, Volume 18, Number 223, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 September 1914 — SPEAKS IN TEN TONGUES [ARTICLE]

SPEAKS IN TEN TONGUES

Young Foreigner Who Began aa a Telegraph Messenger Boy Seeks to Be an Interpreter. New York.—After some years of strenuous preparation, Alexander J. - Tocatli has arrived in America to make his fortune, writes the Cincinnati Times-Star New York correspondent* He brought with him one complete change of clothes, |42 and ten languages. Some one over in Smyrna had told him that there was a keen demand in the cosmopolitan city of New York for competent interpreters and Alexander set out to provide himself with the equipment he considered necessary. His father had been a boatman and occasionally a guide for visitors at Smyrna: Alexander followed in his footsteps, but kept hia eye open for advancement such aa - Smyrna did not promise. He discov- : ered the commercial value of a knowledge of languages and set about learning as many as he could. From the time he was twelve until he was flfteen he studied languages in hia own way, mixing with sailors, business men and tourists who visited Smyrna. ; He was finally able to carry on an ordinary conversation In French. Italian, Spanish. English, German, Turkish, Armenian. Greek and Polish. In the . meantime, he retained the language of 1 his father. Russian. After acting aa- ‘I guide for some officers and jacUea of the American battleship Tennessee, a year ago. he decided to come to Ame*v L lea. He stowed away on a ship and landed in Naples. He went to school three months in Naples and perfect** his knowledge of Italian. Then he ", visited Athens and Marseilles, by the same mode of travel, and studied / Greek and French respectively for the same period in each. {Hi When he arrived in New York he Immediately got a job aa a Western .| Union messenger boy, to prevent the • depletion of his 42 bones, bnt also 1 \ plied for appointment as interpreter j in one of the big east side banks. Afc/| the examination which won him the appointment he proved that he could speak hia ten languages fluently and could write a first-class business letter In five of them. And he is seventeen years old. .