Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 February 1916 — Page 2

THE CRACK RUNNER

By ELIZABETH SCHOEN COBB.

Just one accomplishment Roy Vastlne brought with him when he started a post-graduate course at Lyndhurst college—this comprised being able to run faster and leap farther than any man in the institution. His record past and present was that of “a crack sprinter.” Roy had demonstrated and made good, and it placed him in a certain expert class. He was a frank, credulous young fellow, however, and his previous educational training had been of the home class. His uncle was a retired university professor and had taken pride in storing his mind with a store of profound knowledge, classic and erudite, and had now sent him off to put upon it a modern gloss. One thing the worthy relative had added, was a thorough course of training in athletic exercise. Hence, the robust health of the new student, and hence also the readiness with which he was accepted in his inexperience by the college wolves as a veritable lamb for the slaughter. . They proceeded to nlay the usual amount of college hazing tricks upon him. Roy took it all in a good-na-tured way. Usually he turned the tables on them and their schemes into ridicule. For instance, they lured him to hire a horse and wagon, alleging that they knew a secluded orchard where there could be no visitors after midnight, and where they could get enough luscious apples to last the fraternity for a whole term. They inveigled their ready “victim” into driving in the dark into the middle of abig swamp. There Roy was to wait until he got the “signal.” They went home chuckling over the long and monotonous wait Roy would have. Behold, however, in the morning, bright and early, Roy drove past the ‘'fraternity house with a heaping load of ripe, tempting apples, smiled benignly as he halted in the midst of the juniors, distributed the fruit so

Men Came Rushing at Him.

that none of the plotters got a bite, and informed them coolly that the only “quid pro nunc” they could hppe tor would be the discarded cores. So his fellows were on the lookout for some suggestion or plan where they could get even. In the meantime an episode canie to the front that brought a new interest into the life of the “green*’ student. He and half a dozen of the more sporty of his set"were passing down the road towards the town one bright afternoon, when a dainty phaeton with two ponies attached came into view. They were driven by the prettiest possible girl in the world, at once Roy decided. His companions doffed their caps and flourished about as though they were paying homage to some queen. They fancied themselves lady-killers, and showed it plainly. The young lady responded to their salutation with a dignified bow. Roy stood staring after her as though some new amazing element had come into his life, stunning him. “Hello!” rallied cne of the crowd; “dead stuckr»eh?” “She is the most lovely creature I have ever seen, ’ voiced Roy simply. “All the men are dying tc win her,” was the statement. “I can see your finish —moonstruck. All right, go after her. I’ll bet she’ll turn you down the minute you get gushy. Just as she has seme of the richest fellows in the college.” “I never bet where ladies are concerned,’ - observed Roy, and that remark, respectful and dignified, was Repeated to Miss Olive Mershon, later on. She was the daughter of a rich magnate, the belle of the district and courted by suitors innumerable. It never occurred to Roy that he would dare to do more than adore her at a distance. He did not know that from beneath those long eyelashes of Miss Mershon as she passed the group that day, a pair of bright orbs had taken in the foppish presentation of the others and noted the contrast with the 'simple, sensible attire and frank open 4 face of the new student. Then came the trump trick of the crowd. It appeared that at either extremity of the town there was a foreign community of workmen. They hailed from the same nation in northern Europe, hut were as much divided in a clannish way as if enemies for all £ - ' ■

"Say! I’ve got the great idea,” announced the leader of the mischiefmakers to his cronies one day. “We’ll pretend to teach Roy a new college yell. We*ll get him down among the North squatters and get him to make the 'Maledetti Tedeschi!* cry of the South enders. Say! then see how fast he can run.” The plan was well conceived and carried out. They got Roy into the very center of the North district, feigned a mission around the block and told him to hail them with the new college yell when he got tired of waiting for them. Never for many a long day after that did Roy Vastine forget the startling spectacle that ensued, when he uttered the derisive cry which was a scoff, a challenge, an insult to the community whose precincts he had invaded. As if by magic he became the center of a surging mob. Men came rushing at him with huge fists clenched, women with uplifted mops and pans, children with cudgels and brickbats. Every store and house in the neighborhood poured out a stream of ravenous, incensed human beings. As the true light dawned upon the mind of Roy, he realized that discretion would be the better part of valor. As a big stone grazed his face, he knitted his arms to his side and bent his head and made a dive down a side street. Roy described a tortuous course. One by one his pursuers dropped to the rear. Four or five determined men, however, seemed resolved to keep up with him. He had experienced no fear though betraying prudence against superior numbers. Now the zest of athletics directed and encouraged. At length he came to the limits of the district. A deep drainage ditch fully twelve feet across was in his path. Roy braced mightily. In open admiration his pursuers stood rooted as he cleared the gap, landed on the other side and sank to the ground on the slant beyond to regain his breath. A scream in feminine accents started him again to his feet His quick eyes scanned the expanse about him. “There’s danger,” he uttered sharply. A hundred feet away a team of ponies attached to a phaeton were 'dashing down the narrow “road, the lines entangled in their feet —her phaeton, Miss Mershon and her ponies! His prodigies of valor in saving the occupant of the vehicle from injury, formed the theme of social gossip for a week. In halting the horses his arm had suffered and Roy had to wear it in a sling for some days. Thus invalided and with ample leisure, each day he was an invited guest to the Mershon home. “We’re going to give you a banquet next Tuesday," announced one of the crowd one day. “Thanks,” bowed Roy, with a quizzical look, “but—l’m engaged;” and he left the student to put what construction he liked on his reply. (Copyright, 1916, by W. G. Chapman.)

FOUNDED VILLAGE ON ROCK

Acoma Indians Have Probably the Strangest Settlement in the United States. Perched on the top of a great rock In the neighborhood of 300 feet high stands Acoma, in some respects the strangest village In this country. Acoma is an Indian settlement of some 600 people, and means “ThePebJple of the Rock.” Though the founding of the village is lost in the mist of antiquity, it is supposed the Acoma Indians chose this site as a measure of safety against the warlike Apaches and Navajos of their day. Their selection was niade with admirable judgment, for the walls of the rock are almost perpendicular. The earliest Spanish explorers found the tribe settled securely in their natural fortalice. Acoma has remained delightfully un« touched by the influences of Spanish and American civilization. These Indians'“are cattle, which are pastured on the grazing lands of the valley, where summer villages are located, and where the minimum of effort is required to care for the flocks and herds. Although less

than twenty miles from a railroad, the village is comparatively unknown. The natives do not care for curious visitors. They do not wish to be stared at and photographed. Nevertheless, the irrepressible tourist with his camera occasionally scales the steeps that baffled the Navalo. Nowadays, it is no longer practicable to suppress him' with a tomahawk, so the Acoma are! philosophically making the best of a bad job by collecting two dollars a day for a camera license. The gray adobe village peers from its eyrie over miles of gray plain, dancing in the glare of a burning sun, broken only by the sheer outlines of buttes and mesas.

New Method of Soldering. An electric soldering iron of radically new design has recently made its appearance in the United States. Instead of employing the usual form of electric heating unit to heat the soldering iron, two carbon or carborundum high-resistance points are mounted a fraction of an inch apart, and so placed that the article to be soldered is bridged across them. The two points become incandescent, and apply their heat at the spot desired. Whereas it to heat the usual form of electric iron, the new soldering device is instantly ready for use. It consumes current only during actual use, and eliminates all losses of heat through conduction and radiation incidental to the usual irons, in which a large mass of metal must be heated. s

’ THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

GERMAN SUBMARINE AT FULL SPEED

This is an unusual view of a German submarine running at full speed on the surface, with her commander in the conning tower.

UNCLE SAM IS EYE DOCTOR TO MOUNTAINEERS

Public Health Service Doing Great Work Among Purest Blooded Americans. TRACHOMA IN THE MOUNTAINS Curing of Sore Eyes on an Enormous Scale Is Humanitarian Task Being Performed in Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia. Washington. —In a way—a very dif.erent way—the United States public health service is doing the very thing which Mark Twain’s irresistible “Colonel Sellers” proposed to do with his “matchless, incomparable and altogether marvelous eye-water.” The colonel’s plea for his eye-water, very much paraphrased, ran something like this: “One million people in the United States have sore eyes, one million, sir! And now come I, with nature’s most potent balsam —dew of earliest morn, plus distillations of the rarest herbs of field and forest —which, upon dropping one drop in the eye, soothes and cools, and which, upon repetition until the entire bottle is used, forever banishes pains and aches of every description. We ■will sell 10,000 bottles the first year at $2 a bottle —10,000 people cured of sore eyes, $20,000! We will Bell 20,000 bottles the second year —20,000 pairs of eyes made whole, 20,000 grateful hearts, $40,000! The third year we will sell, etc.” The public health service is not pushing its own or anybody’s eye-wa-ter, and is not advancing its own or anybody’s money-making scheme. But its most picturesque work' has to do with the curing of sore eyes on an enormous scale. If direct parallel lies with the visionary scheme of Colonel Sellers, it is in the number of grateful hearts which thank this federal agency for restored vision. This humanitarian work is being done among the purest-blooded white Americans in America —the mountaineers of Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia. Down in these mountains, in small, isolated towns, far from railroads, are five little government hospitals which treat victims of sore eyes on a scale as large as that of many of the numerous city hospitals devoted to this specialty. Trachoma in the Mountains. -The chief cause of “sore eyes” in the mountains is trachoma. Possibly Mark Twain knew the prevalence of this affliction in the mountain sections of the South and Middle West and hence knew of the acute need for -some such wonderful concoction as Colonel Sellers’ eye-water. Very likely, the great humorist drew his inspiration from this knowledge.

i Strange to say, however, the wider ' spread existence of trachoma within the borders of the United States waited many years for official “discovery.” i For a long time, the experts talked of trachoma as an exotic disease. On the theory that it came from abroad and the chief danger to the American public lay in the admission of infected immigrants, trachoma was made one of the quarantinable diseases, j Every applicant for entry into the United States is carefully examined for traces of trachoma and thousands of otherwise good citizen-material have been turned back to their native landsTrom our ports because they had trachoma.

The “discovery” came a little more than three years ago, when Dr. J. A. Stuckey of Lexington, Ky., called the attention of federal authorities to the numerous cases of trachoma in the Kentucky mountains. Surgeon John McMullen, who had experience with trachoma patients at the New York and Philadelphia immigration stations, conducted an investigation. Of 4,000 mountaineers examined, it was found thqf §OO had trachoma. In consequence the hospitals were established; three in Kentucky, one in Virginia and one in West Virginia; at Jackson, London j -- J ond at Oophurn Va., and Welch, W. Va. These hospitals had more than 1,700 cases and performed 193 eye operations last October. . • Effect In the Mountain*Trachoma is a disease of the eyelids. Granulated or Bandy lids, it is often called. It leads to serlou* in- . .T , ■ **■.•*. ■V' ■' •• * - J.. • i ..- : V..

flammation and blindness. It is both communicable and curable Among the mountaineers the work of curing the actual cases is proceeding rapidly; but more important is the task of teaching the mountain population to avoid infection by adopting more sanitary living arrangements. Their cabin homes are overcrowded; they use common wash basins and common towels; the mother is apt to wipe the eyes of the child with an apron upon which she wipes her own. These people have lived much as they do now for 160 years, and, except for communicable diseases, such as trachoma, they are a healthy class. To effect change among them, in view of their isolation and decidedly settled opinions, has been a large undertaking. The public health service is working a change among them, however. Frequent meetings are held in schoolhouses and churches, at which stereopticon slides are exhibited showing the precise means by which trachoma and other diseases, including typhoid, spread. This campaign of education has made rapid headway and, as cures multiply, the faitji of the mountain public in Uncle Sam’s teaching is increased. Only a few years ago the sort of visitor from the United States government who was familiar in the Kentucky mountains carried a Winchester. He was looking for secret whisky stills and was venturing upon a dangerous errand among a very hostile people. The good Samaritan from the public health office, ppon his errand of love and charity, has npw become as thoroughly an established character in this rugged region as the internal revenue agent used to be. Probably no other influence has served more effectively to bring the outside world into close and friendly relations with the mountaineers. Sixty Miles for Treatment. “That these people realize and appreciate what we are trying to do for them,” said the medical officer in charge of the trachoma work at the headquarters of the public health service in Washington recently, “was impressed upon toe by an incident which occurred when I was at the Hindman hospital not long since. “An old man brought in his son who was badly afflicted with trachoma. It was decided that an operation was necessary, but the boy overheard us tell his father this.- The lad slipped out and ran away, home. It was 20 miles across the mountains. The father and son had walked this 20 miles to the hospital. “The father at once walked back, found his son and repeated the long foot journey into Hindman the next day, where the operation was performed and the boy cured. That meant a. 60-mile trip on foot —hard, rough going all the way—by the parent to force his son to take advantage of the opportunity offered by the government. “When we see these things we know our work is well worth doing.” The appeal of such incidents to the hearts of a simple, natural and kindly people is manifest. There was the case of a mother of four children, none of whom she had ever seen. ThA vision of both eyes was so far impaired by trachoma that in bright sunlight she could not recognize anyone. Following brief treatment at one of the mountain hospitals she returned to her family and saw her children for the first time. There was an old man who was led 40 miles across the mountains for treatment. Though blind for years, his vision was restored and he returned home without escort. As stated, there Is no miracle-cure about it; no use of marvelous eye-wa-ter, no mystery whatever. Eliminating medical terms, it Is largely a business of rolling back and sandpapering the inside of the eyelids. After that, comes thorough cleansing, continued regularly by the patient. Of course, if the convalescent returns -to the cabin and uses infected towels, the disease returns. The work of the government surgeons in the mountains is not limited to trachoma. Not long ago one unusually busy day, an assistant surgeon general of the public health service received an unexpected visitor. It was a teacher from Hindman, Ky., where the eye hospital has since been established. She had ridden 23 miles to the railroad station and thence had made the long trip to Washington upon most urgent business. The assistant surgepn general had made her acquaintance* ftx-course of fh%4w£chomi*fleld investigations. Finding Typhoid Source. "Doctor," she said, “there are 50. cases of typhoid in Hindman and no means of caring for them. We do not know the cause of the epidemic and I came here to see if you cannot help us.”

“How long will you be taawol 1 * aha was asked. “I am stalling back this afternoon. ’ “We'll send one of our men with you.” So, the second day following, a federal health officer accompanied the schoolteacher on the ride into Hindman. In a sense, the surgeon went armed, but not with rifle and ammunition. A packhorse bore his arms —a very ordinary looking box containing a field laboratory especially designed for emergency war against typhoid. He had serums for those already ill and assisted the local doctors materially in treating those already sick. What was more important, he had the means of locating the cause of the epidemic. This, after patient investigation, he finally discovered. A typical mountain stream, cold and clear as crystal, runs through the center of the town. Some three miles up this stream the federal surgeon found the home of a “chronic typhoid case.” In Hindman the stream flowed near a well used by the pupils of the school. The water from the stream, bearing typhoid germs, had seeped through crevices in a limestone formation into the well. "

PAROLED MAN A TRAVELER

Goes All Over the World and Reports Regularly Each Month Oregon Judge. Salem, Ore.—Although he has traveled to nearly every part of the world since his parole a year ago by Circuit Judge Percy R. Kelly of this district, John. Schulz, convicted of attacking George Brown, a Newberg farmer, has faithfully reported his whereabouts each month. In a letter received Schulz says he is “somewhere in France” and on his way to London.—A- few months ago Schulz reported from Canada, where he said he had been arrested as a German spy. He was released lfiter, and to avoid further difficulties in his next letter he signed the name John Wilson. Since his parole Schulz has reported from Atlantic coast citieß, Canada, South America, Sweden and France. >

USE WITCHCRAFT IN INDIANA

Polish Woman -In South Bend Gives Dying Infant Blood Taken From Mother. South Bend, Ind. —Witchcraft is being practiced by certain Polish persons on the West side here. At an insanity inquest it has been learned that an aged woman, giving her name as Gottlieba Borkowska, has been posing as a witch. A few daya ago when a four-months-old babe was dying in the household of Jan Bykowsky, the Borkowska woman appeared and induced the mother to give a teaspoonful of blood from the veins in her neck and feed it to the child. This, asserted the "witch,” would save the infant. The mother was charged a $3 fee, and the next day became temporarily insane. In one instance the Borkowska woman is said to have’*, scourged children to drive out the devil.

MRS. ALBERT T. CHURCH

Mrs. Albert T. Church, wife of Lieutenant Church, U. S. N., holds an important place among the women who are entertaining this season in tha army and navy set of Washington. Green Skeleton of Early Man. Prescott, Ariz.—The skeleton of a prehistoric man, of a beautiful shade of green, has been dug up in the residential district here. The verdant coloring was a puzzle until it was discovered the bones had become incrusted with copper. The skull showed unusual cranial development.

No Poor In This Town.

Hoquiam, Wash.—This city bears the distinction, according to the official head of the Salvation Army, of being the only city in the Northwest that hah no poverty and no needy people. He bases his opinion on the fact, that he. has no calls for old clothing or other assistance.

UPWARD, ONWARD

Man’s Destiny Will Not Allow the Possibility of a Backward Step. Why are we here? Where did we come from? Where are we going? These are three questions we are all bound to ask, but the answer may never come. All the perplexing prob- , lems of religion and philosophy are involved in these three questions. As a rule we are concerned with the “Meaning of Life,” as it applies to ourselves, whereas it has to do v?ith the realization of the kingdom; it is social and "not individual, co-operative and not competitive. Tolstoy wrote; .“The meaning of life comprehensible to man is the establishment of the kingdom of God upon earth ; that Is, in replacing the egoistic, hate-inspired, violent, irrational organization of society, by a loving, fraternal one.” Man’s birthright is happiness. All natural Instincts are on that side, but the difficulty is how* to obtain it. If it be the gratification of the animal instincts, it is easily and readily obtained; but, thank God, man is something infinitely more than the animal. I have met men and worsen of every position, from the casual laborer to the aristocrat, and I have seen them try to obtain happiness and miss it I have seen the man satisfy his mere animal instincts. I have seen the rich satiated with sensations, and they are the tragedies of life and happiness; the meaning is unknown. They have had the momentary tickling of a nerve, and then —hell. Why are we such fools? We see the failure of others, and yet we fail to be wise. We have been duped by the interpretation of happiness as “pleasure," as something objective. That is, something brought to us, Instead of something born within us, peace, rest, freedom and therefore joy. Evolution Always. Tolstoy is right when he says, “Here is no object." -What he means is that there is nothing which you can place as final, the attainable. The highest art of life is evolutionary, to go on and on and yet still to see the possibility of advance. “The end, attainable only in eternity, which is placed before man, is inaccessible to him; but the direction toward It is attainable.” This Is the glory of Christianity; you die in harness, you never come up to the goal. The Sermon on the Mount is impracticable, so the cynics say. Yes, and they are right, and therein is the most eloquent testimony. You are always going on and on. You mount one peak and you are charmed with the scenery, but beyond there are other mountains, higher still, to call and fascinate with yet more glorious scenery. This Is man’s destiny, to go forward. Our greatest temptation is to rush and hurry, to be impatient of our progress, to be bitterly disappointed about our failures, but all great things are achieved by evolution. My friend, the artist, Mr. Frederick Shields, the last of the pre-Raphaelite school, told me there were four virtues taught in the New Testament —Faith, Hope, Love and Patience —and I have come to be lieve he was right, and the last is often the most difficult to practice, and when accomplished will often be found to be the key of the others. The greatest men and women of the world have lust been the “quiet ones.” The western world has accomplished much, but its greatest inspirations have come from the quietude of eastern mysticism. Sign That Work Is Not Right. The only way to Increase life is to give, you must work; If you do not feel the increase of love and vitality, know then that your work is not right. I am quite aware of the awful monotony of some of the work you have to do to earn bread and butter, but though a machine may Imprison your hands, nothing can make a slave of your mind; keep that free and, believe me, you can do great things If you think purely and altruistically. This war is Burely teaching us the value of living for others, and although you may have doubts about many of the doctrines of religion, the human and divine meaning of the atonement is just living to make other people happy. You must do good to be good, piety without service is a fraud; use your gifts, your time, your soul, and then you will grow and understand that life is not a pond, but a flowing river. - The call is to our best. I know it sounds prosaic, but the mechanic, the clerk, the servant girl can only fulfill the will of God by doing their best. Many people are waiting jfor something big to do and neglecting the plain duty that lies close at hand. Cultivate the home patch, and then, and then only, will you understand the meaning of life. — Rev. A. J. Waldros.

Religious Obligations.

“It is an extraordinary fact that so many American men should be willing to shirk their religious obligations. They do it habitually, while in the days of courtship they may be found in the church, but after the wedding day they attend church less frequently, and by and by drop out altogether. This constitutes for many a woman her first serious domestic problem. She does not know what her duty is. She loves the church, and she also loves her husband. If he prefers to stay at home, she is likely to stay with him. In this way many a woman crucifies her spiritual inclinations and sinks down into the indifference of a worldly life.”—Charles E, Jefferson in Woman’s Homo Companion.