Evening Republican, Volume 20, Number 309, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 29 December 1916 — Page 2

Blind Love

By Florence L. Henderson

(Copyright, ISIS, by W. G. Chapman.) Nobody in the world was good enough for Ina Reeves, in the opinion of Jasper Grantham. That was why, the first time he saw her, he shut himself up in his library and spent a serious hour in calm and somewhat bitter reflection. “Kill it off, you plain-looking old fossil !’’ he spoke, shaking his fist at himself in the mirror. “Seventeen and twenty-seven —it won’t do. Moreover, aside from your appalling homeliness, you are in a rut fogy ideas. You musl never leading a bright young spirit like Ina Reeves into it — no, no, your duty is plain. Find for her a life partner in her own class, bright, sprightly, handsome.” Grantham had unexpectedly found himself in a position which gravely disturbed the even system of his career. He lived with his piarried sister, Bertha Marshall, and he fancied he had found the ideal environment of bachelor life. He was a good deal disturbed when Bertha came to him to announce that the widowed mother of Ina, her girlhood’s dearest friend, dying, had left him as guardian and she protectress of her only child, an artless, lovely girl of seventeen. Ina snuggled into their hearts from the first moment that her affectionate way and radiant beauty burst upon them bewitchingly in their charming fullness. She was all love and tenderness toward Mrs. Marshall and treated

“You Plain-Looking Old Fossil!"

her as a second mother. With Grantham there was a marked constraint from the first. He was ten years the senior of Ina. She was timid in his presence, awed at times when the rare intellectuality of his mind was displayed. Ina seemed to regard him as “the smartest man in the world.” She told Mrs. Marshall so confidentially. When Ina learned that the estate was loaded down with-difficult complication and debt, she actually wept with gratitude toward the' unselfish man who Was shouldering this new burden. Every day Grantham felt that this (lovely girl was winning her way closer and closer to his innermost heart. Numberless little courtesies, evincing thoughtfulness and interest, dazzled him, even thrilled him. He attributed it all to an undeveloped sense, as of a child to a father or brother. He saw the danger line, made an iron resolution and prepared to execute it. From that time on be spoke less frequently .to Ina. At times he actually avoided her. Mrs. Marshall was one day deeply distressed when Ina rushed into her room, where she was sewing, and threw herself on her knees and, burying her face in her lap, burst into a torrent of tears. “Why, my darling!” spoke Mrs. Marshall, deeply distressed. “What is troubling your poor gentle heart?” j But only through incoherent sobbings and irrational grief would Ina voice her grievance. There no definable complaint in her murmurfngs, only tlje- growing distant manner of Grantham wounded her tender spirit. Had she offended him? Was he getting tired of having a stranger about the house? Mrs. Marshall opened her eyes wide as, scanning the situation critically, she realized that this innocent, ingenuous child h*td stumbled on the ' threshold of dawning love, and she marveled at the unconceivable blindness of her brother. She soothed the distress of her innocent charge, explaining that Grantham had many professional cares on his mind. She said nothing to her brother, not quite certain that he had been particularly attracted by Ina, but surmising a vast deal of the little romance that was weaving Itself about the lives of a young impressionable girl and a man who did not know the feminine heart and its various moods. “We are going to have a visitor, Bertha," announced her brother a few days inter. “You remember our old friend, Morris Duane? I have invited his son, young Glann Duane, for his two weeks’ vacation." '

••Brother!” abruptly exclaimed Mrs. Marshall, a quickening animation in her face, “you are not thinking of Ina in bringing these two' together?” “Just that," nodded Grantham, the shadow of a smile on ills face. “Why not? He is nearly her age. We know the family as eminently respectable. Ina must have young company some time in her life." “Yes, I see,” murmured Mrs. Marshall, very slowly, and said no more. Famously the two young people got on together. They indulged in all the Joys of summering. Ina was an .outdoor witch in every sense of the word, and she led the rather indolent and' ease-loving Duune a race over meadows, into the woods, glad of a companion, but one day confidentially announcing that “Duane was rather more stupid than her idea of a model young man.” Granthdm was all consideration and encouragement toward Duane. He had canker in Ills soul, but hid it well. He envied the heedless, rollicking pair in their full enjoyment of the lovely hours, trying-to imagine himself an old man and pooh-poohing any sentiment in the situation outside of duty. • There came a crisis. A catastrophe precipitated it. One day Grantham, passing down the shore of the river, was aroused from a deep reverie by a shriek, keen, sudden, piercing. He stood appalleif as he traced its source. A hundred feet ahead was an upturned skiff in Hie swift current. Clinging to a rock it had struck and upset, shattered, was Duane, apparently dazed and helpless. Floating down the stream was Ina. It was the work of a moment for Grantham to throw off his coat and plunge into the stream. Twice Ina had sunk under the surface before he reached her. She was nearly exhausted as he finally caught her, got her ashore and placed her against a tree, half-fainting, throwing his coat across her shoulders. He waited until she had recovered somewhat and directed her to hurry home. He dared not trust himself longer in her presence. Those clinging arms, that grateful face thrilled him till he could have kissed the blue lips in ecstacy. The episode passed by. Duane was rescued from the position he had rather selfishly, it would seem, adhered to. There was an after effect, however, which Grantham could not help but notice. Ina did not sfem to care for her forest strolls with Duane any longer. She came more into the way of Grantfiam. He fancied her eyes expressed a subdued but unmistakable glow —gratitude, appeal, he could not coherently analyze it.

One day Grantham was halted as he passed a thick garden copse. Beyond it in quite excited tones Ina was speaking. “The idea!” she cried. “Morris Duane! Suggesting that I encourage him, when I wouldn’t have him if he were the last man in the world. We are good friends, but he had half a dozen girl friends in the city, and he isn’t smart, and he doesn’t know how to swim—and I don’t love him, and I think it’s a shame to pick out a husband for me, as if —as if I haven’t my own choice!” and the indignant tones trailed off into a sob and Ina rah into a far corner of the garden to weep out her emotions alone. “My troubled little one,” spoke Grantham, approaching her and placing a trembling hand upon her bowed -head, “what is grieving you?” and then, as her dear eyes met his own, he lost all self-restraint. “Ina,” he spoke ardently, “I love you!” She clasped her hands across his own, irradiated with joy. “Oh, I hoped it!” she breathed ecstatically, “and, you sever-guessed that I longed for you to Tfey it, all along!”

Musical “Soles.”

I have ever been a fond lover of music—that is, good music. Music that does not grate upon the ear like the filing of crosscut saws I can tplerate or even enjoy, if need be. It’ may be repeated a thousand times per day upon a coffee grinder or phonograph; if it bristles with harmony every repetition adds joy unto my bosom. I also love the shrill notes of the oriole and the lonesome, muffled ditto of the cuckoo. These do not tire me in the least; but I shall never become accustomed to the inharmonious squeak of new shoes. Manufacturers of shoes who make a specialty of the squeaky variety should pay more attention to pairing them up in iiarmonious duets. I cannot imagine a greater shock to a nervous system thsfn ill-tuned footwear. The squeak! squeak! of the hired girl’s high-heeled, bronzed number tens would drive a saint to cuss words. But we must not heap our displeasure upon the poor girl. She is not the author. She is only the reproducer. She merely acts the part that the wax cyif inder performs for the phonograph. There Is just as great a necessity for a musical director In an up-to-date shoe factory as there is in grand opera, and no workman should be per mitted to build a pair of squeaky shoes unless he can pass a severe test in harmony ! —Cartoons Magazine.

Minus the Change.

Snobkins had just settled down comfortably in the smoking car that was to carry him home after a day at the ofliee, when, to his disgust, the door opened and a fellow-clerk entered. “Hullo, Snobby!” cried the newcomer. “For mercy’S sake put out that disgusting weed!” “Disgusting weed, indeed!” retorted Snobkins, angrily. “When Ido give a quarter for a cigar—"' “Yes,” interrupted the other quickly, “when you do give quarter for a cigar—you get twenty cents change!” —Philadelphia Public Ledger.

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN, RENSSELAER, IND.

POLO IS MOST POPULAR ALL-AROUND SPORT

FAST GAME AT AIKEN, SOUTH CAROLINA.

Polo is played in this country practically all the year round. During the winter months ‘the climate and conditions of the grounds are suitable for the Pacific coast clubs, Hawaii and the Philippines; in spring the game is played in the Southern circuit, which includes Aiken, Camden, the several army posts, and Washington; in the late spring the game is popular in Philadelphia and adjacent suburban clubs and Lakewood, N. J., and is next followed by the Western and mid-Western circuits. In May and June the game is in u swing at all the Eastern clubs and Narragansett Pier, R. 1., annual y witnesses the championship series extending over a period of several "eeks.ln the recent tourney decided there the mounts used represented a cost of from $50,000 to SIOO,OOO.

SPORTING WORLD

Boston has an Interscholastic Ice Hockey league. * * * Richmond (Va.) junior high school teams are playing soccer football. * * * New York university will add a swimming team to its activities. * * * Birmingham, Ala., contemplates constructing a municipal golf course. * * * Eighty or more new 2:10 tyotters will join the select ranks this year. * * * Princeton’s first baseball game, next year will be March 24 with Dickinson. * * * The agitation to put a ban on all kinds of betting in baseball is a good one. * * * A movement has been started io build a half-mile track in Lincoln park, Chicago. * * * Football is a game that requires a stiff backbone, a stiff arm and a stiffer upper lip. * * * Ward Miller, veteran right fielder of the Browns, is to be operated on for a double hernia. ** * A Stoughton A. Fletcher has engaged the young western trainer Henry Thomas for 1917. * * * Gaiety Lee 2:16*4, dam of Lee Axworthy, is in foal to San Francisco 2:07%, this year. * * * People who speak of “playing golf” do not have the right idea. Golfers do not play —they work. .j: * * * The pacing stallion Minor Heir 1:58%, by Ileir-at-Law, will make his future home at Millston, Tenn. * * * Why is it that all those football players we see in the papers must have their hands on their hips? * * * Soccer clubs of Philadelphia and vicinity boast 3,800 players enrolled in the district governing association. * * * The Australian Jockey club subscribed and raised for English patriotic purposes during the last year $186,850. Boston, Brooklyn and Cincinnati will not be represented in the Interstate Three-Cushion league this season. * * * Mabel Trask, 2:03%, won 13 races and more than $33,000 in light harness races over grand circuit tracks this year. * * * Jose R. Capablanca, the Cuban champion chess player, will give a series of lectures in New York November 14 and 21. * * * Tris Speaker is wise enough to know that he is a star In the playing end of the game and that he might be a dub as a manager. * * * Washington university of St. Louis is gathering funds for a proposed $15,000 swimming pool. The students raised $4,000 at a recent meeting. *** > 1 Big preparations are already being made on the Pacific coast to entertain the Cubs if go, there next spring to 3sf their spring conditioning. * * * Cornell University Athletic association has sold over 2.500 season tickets at $lO each to students entitling the holders to ail major sport games,there. ** • V That German scientist who says women have less lung power than men never attended a high-school basketball game and listened to the rooting.

COOMBS WELL-GUARDED WHILE ON BALL FIELD

Every time Jack Coombs, ; pitcher of the Brooklyn (Nation- ; al league) champions, goes out on ; the field to pitch he' wears a I heavy rubber brace from knee to ; hip, and supplements this with ; yards and yards of bandages. I-Jack also carries a heavy steel ! brace as a protective device. I They are necessary, following ’ his severe illness which ended ! his career with the Athletics. ’ His wonderful stamina is shown j by his ability again to hold his | end up as a pitcher with the ; champions of 1916. Coombs ; alone beat the Red Sox in the ; recent series and has never been ; defeated in a world’s series.

CLABBY RETAINS COOL HEAD

Laughs at Warning of Newspaper Men That George Chip Had a Punch — Kids With Scribes. Jimmy Clabby is a fine example of the boxer who keeps cool at all times. Jimmy was boxing 20 rounds with’ George Chip at Daly City. He had been warned that if Chip ever connected with his chin he would be “knocked dead.” Along about the tenth round, while sitting in his corner, Clabby leaned

Jimmy Clabby.

over and spoke to those in the press SGfltS* “Say,” he said, “I thought you fellows said this guy had a punch.” “Better be careful, Jim,” cautioned one of the scribes, “if he lands you’ll find out.” Clabby threw back his head and laughed. Then he came back with this: “If a guy has a 1 punch and can’t land it he hasn’t got it, has he?” The newspaper men had no immediate reply to the question. Jimmy had their goat. And throughout the remainder of the fight, between rounds and in the clinches, Clabby kept kidding the newspaper men about the punch that wasn’t landing.

TRACKS FOR AUTO SPEEDING

Present Prospects Are That Five New Plants Will Be Added to Circuit Next Season. Although the majority of the 12 motor speedways npw in operation have not made on their races this Season; present prospects are that five new tracks will be added to the circuit next season. Pittsburgh has just announced a million-dollar plant. Philadelphia and Birmingham^ 1 Ala., have tracks in the process of construction, while New Orleans and Columbus, O* have speedway projects in the process of promotion. The 12 tracks now completed that have staged races within the last year follow: Indianapolis, New York, Cincinnati, Chicago, Los Angeles, Tacoma, Minneapolis, Kansas City, Des Moines, Omaha, Sioux City and Providence.

WATCH JONES’ OUTFIT

Will Be Real Dark Horse in Next Season’s Race. Manager Contends That Pitching ia First Essential for Winning Combination—McGraw of New York Giants Agrees.

Grandstand managers are pretty well agreed that' Fielder Jones’ Brownies lack that run-making essential —a punch. Sixty-four games of the onerun margin variety, 35 of these defeats, are pointed to as evidence that the club is deficient in batting effectiveness, writes Ed Wray in St. Louis PostDispatch. It is also agreed by the amateur managers that Fielder Jones is making a mistake in sitting tight with his present outfit and in planning to continue his 1917 campaign with the same punchless cast. But there is the large “on-the-other-handl’ 1;q his argument, one that can be backed up by figures. Batting is far from being everything in the life of a successful team; and that the injection of a little more timeliness into the swatting of our Brownies, plus the team’s great superiority in speed, may yet vindicate the club’s manager. The answer to this view will, of course, be: “See what happened to the club this year. It had a fair trial.” Jones argues differently. He maintains that a good start would have brought confidence and a near-first-place position to his club. Jones holds—and he is supported by facts*—that pitching is the first thing

Manager Fielder Jones.

needed by a team. With that anything is possible. He regards the failure of his own club as due to Koob’s illness at the start and in midseason Davenport’s failure to round to form until he had lost about nine games. Plank’s tardy return to championship class and the failure of Hamilton to come through, rather than to the downfall of clean-up men Pratt and Marsans. Johnny McGraw is ready to O. K. the view about pitching. For, while everybody is crediting his new infield with the return to winning form of the Giants, it is noteworthy that the pitchers of the club, in annexing their long string of victories, allowed a grand average of only 1.5 earned runs per nineinning game.

M’LOUGHLIN STAYS IN GAME

California Star Will Not Forsake Pastime That Made Him Famous— Will Return to East. Maurice E. -McLoughlin, the California star has not forsaken the game that made him famous. At the close of the title tourney at Forest Hills, 111., the former national champion said: “I am quoted every year as saying that I have played my last set of tournament tennis, while as a matter of fact, I have never made such a statement. Any man who has been an athlete and then enters a business career with its confinement indoors knows it is impossible to keep his physical condition perfect. That has been my trouble, but if I get the opportunity, I will return to the East and tournament play.”

DEFEATED BOXER IN DEMAND

Charley White, Who Failed to Lift Lightweight Championship Title, Receives Offers. While Charley White, who failed to annex the lightweight title in his bout with Freddie Welsh at Colorado Springs, Colo., is appearing theatrically in the West, his manager is receiving all kinds of offers for White’s services. The best offer comes from New York, where White is wanted to fight two contests, one against Benny Leonard and the other against Johnny Dundee. White will accept when he finishes his engagements.

HOPPE CHANGES HIS STYLE

Champion Billiardist Drives Around Table Rather Than Take Chances on Thin ShoL 1 a ______ Balk line billard champion Willie Hoppe is said to have changed his style since last year. Formerly he , played close shots with a “shave” English figuring to get the feather edge of each sphere. Now he drives around the table rather than play a thin shot, his object being to keep the object balls continually in front of the cue ball. He is hitting the balls full and taking no chances on spectacular shots.

Home Town Helps

THAT HOME-TOWN FEELING Something That Is Never Forgotten, No Matter How £ar Wanderings May Carry One. Most people grow up with the hometown feeling for the old town, the town where they were youngsters, where, they knew every kitten and puppy, every street and every alley, every Cracker barrel and every candy counter, everybody and everything at least for many a block around. It was not of course a fueling of which you were uncomfortably conscious. As likely as not you never knew that you had it until yoircame back after the summer in the country or perhaps came home from school for the holidays. It was then that the home-town feeling grew large within you, a fine, big, warm spot of feeling. Ir it lmpp ned that you lived in a medium-sized town in those days, the sight of the station was a deeply satisfying thing. It seemed as you rattled along in the little old hack, past the courthouse square and across the one street car line, that you had come back to yourself, a very comfortable sort of feeling indeed. Perhaps you lived in or near a much smaller village, but it was the same home-town feeling you had as you climbed under the heavy, horsey-smelling robe into the buggy and rode down the street. The general store, the white church, the brick house where the one rich family lived and the patched-up cabin where the one poor family lived were so familiar to you that you were immediately conscious of every new sign in the store window and every new- patch in the cabin roof. And if, perhaps, you lived in a much larger town, the. distant smoke, the insistent clamor, the crowds and the rush of traffic were the things you were looking fpr and the things that satisfied the home-town

feeling. The home-town feeling for the new town, the town where you go after you are grown up, the town where you work, the town that adopts you or that you adopt, is, of coursq, not so natural or easy a thing. At least it is ,not a thing which can be deliberately acquired along with a new job or even with the actual purchase of a new house. It is not a thing that comes with friends of with pleasant associations. It seems to come just of itself and it coined, some day, all of a sudden. You may be standing in a crowded, street car, you may be pushing your way 'through the market, you may be sitting on your own back step while supper is cooking. It is certain to come when you are not thinking or caring particularly about it, .and when it comes it lias come to stay.

PLEA FOR BETTER SCHOOLS

mproved Methods of Education and Hygiene Are Urged Upon .Counttry's Smaller Communities. The federal school extension agent, Mr. Mcßrien, wrote recently in a special statement: “In educational opportunity the city boy and girl have privileges far superior to those of the farm boy and farm girl. In funds, in length of term, in equipment, in buildings, in administration and supervision, in courses of study, in efficiency of the teaching force, and in salaries. paid, the superiority" of the city schools is so far above that of the rural schools as to make the situation in many sections of the county deplorable. It has been so desperate in many instances during the past 25 years, when contrasted with the splendid opportunities of the city school, that it is given more times than any other reason by fathers jmd mothers for moving from the farm to the city.” ofher critics are laying stress on •ural sanitation and hygiene. Senator Ransdell, chairman of the senate committee on-health and quarantine, has been urging a special inquiry into the methods of preventing disease in rural America, particularly such diseases as malaria and typhoid, which are wholly* preventable. The senator’s measure proposes systematic co-operation between. Joggl and national authorities, and is based on the idea that “the problem of rural sanitation is not a local problem, but one which concerns the health and physical integrity of our entire nation.” The two diseases named, it is estimated, cost the country $900,000,000 a year.

To Imitate Thatch Roof.

Of the various attractive sects which can be achieved with either the asphalt or the wood shingle, none are more popular at present than that of the imitation of the old English thatch. This effect is obtained by what Is known as the woven shingle method, whereby the shingles are laid In courses varying in width from one inch to seven inches. r While undoubtedly a roof of this sort lends charm and distinction to houses of a certain style of architecture, from yhe nature of the workmanship required in its construction, the roof caphot jao considered a cheap one. To those who do not have to consider expense closely, the soft finish of the imitation thatch must make a strong appeal.