Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 37, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 February 1918 — Page 3

Spug for a Day

By James Osborn

<Copyrl*ht, McClure Nawapafrar Syndloata.) Clarice Wardhata and Nancy Smith had gone through high school together and their friendship was of the sort that could not be altered, even when Nancy went to business school and later took a stenographer’s position in a business office, and Clarice, through her father’s acquired fortune, became one of the most sought after young women in what chose to be called, and was called Society, with a capital S. Clarice did not give Nancy her old •dresses, nor did she try to persuade ’her to attend the parties she gave, to which only folk with very much more money to spend than Nancy had were Invited. When she asked Nancy to her house it was either to enjoy her alone or with a few of the old friends with’ whom Nancy could be most at her •ease. Thus Nancy was never made conscious of the fact that fortune had dealt less kindly with her than it had With Clarice, If indeed it really had. When Clarice first met Robert Harrow and somehow unwittingly charmed ®nd then captivated that inveterate man of business, she did not tell him that Nancy Smith, his .private secretary, was one of her best friends. It was not in the least because she was (ashamed of her association, but because she liked the idea of having a means of seeing Mr. Harrow from another angle than that of society and (country club activities without his (knowing it. Clarice, truth to say, was Idrawn to Harrow almost as soon as he 'was to her, for there was something (about this rather rough strange mixture of a man that charmed women rquite as much as if he had been most (courteous and courtly. Sometimes he (seemed the broadest of men in his (large grasp of events that Clarice disicussed with him, and sometimes the (narrowest in his point of view, that seemed to see only his own business (Interests. Sometimes he seemed the 'most generous and unselfish, and then ithe least generous and most selfish. Drawn though Clarice was to, this much discussed and almost eccentric •young man, she planned to surrender, if she surrendered at all, with deliberation; She had planned not to lose a single trick in the love game she was about to play with this man, who had become accustomed to having things generally his own way in the other games of life. It has been said that a man's stenographer has an opportunity to know him even better than his own wife, for she sees him more hours of the day 'usually, and can study him without (personal prejudice of any sort. Nancy Smith surely knew Robert Harrow better than he knew himself, and It was perhaps not strange that she suspected he was In love before he was willing to admit that fact to himself, much less to Clarice. She had heard from Clarice of the friendship that had •sprung up between her and Mr. Harrow, and with Infinite care sounded her regarding him and so found out Ihow the ground lay. Once Clarice, with an attempt at seeming casual, asked Nancy what sort of a husband she thought Mr. Harrow would make. "I could be hjs stenographer all my Ulfe and enjoy It,” explained Nancy, ■“but I could never endure him as a husband. But with a girl like you, it would be different. 4 You .would collapse after a day in his office; but with all the little feminine witcheries to fall back on you, or a girl like you, I should say, might find him a perfect husband.” “One thing Mr. Harrow’s w’lfe would have to remember, though,” added Nancy, “and that Is that she should' never once let him take her for granted. It would be like taming a lion—once the beast knows his power, the tamer is lost. Some women are cut out for just that sort of thing, you know, and never in a lifetime let their husbands know what meek, tame hearts they have." Nancy and Clarice thus’ discussed Mr. Harrow over the chocolate cups one day at luncheon, late In December, when Clarice had gone downtown for Christmas shopping. That afternoon Harrow gave the switchboard operator gruff orders to the effect that he was “too busy, to be. disturbed,” and then sat at his desk, with no one but Nancy sharing his solitude, looking blankly into space for a full hour, his head bent and his arms akimbo. He started to his feet when he roused himself and paced the floor Impatiently. “Take this.” he .threw at Nancy. “Memcr for the cashier’s office —‘Owing to war conditions and necessity _to curtail every possible expense, we shall -give no gold pieces at Christmas.* ” Nancy took the words down in dots, curves and dashes, and recalled as she did so that, in the flrm of which Harrow was president “war conditions” had meant 25 per cent greater profit than usual. "Take this," he threw o.ut again. “It is for my housekeeper, Mrs. Hawkins. Owing to war conditions, I have found It inadvisable to dispense with any additlonal money in the wages to the , servants this year.* And when you

have done that write a personal letter to my sister, and another to my cousin —the one with six children —and explain to them that as an act of patriotism we ought to refrain from giftgiving this year. It’s just an exchange of a lot of junk,” he went on, more to himself than to Nancy, “between a lot of people that don’t carq two straws for each other. Then write a letter to the matron of the orphan home —the one my mother used to be so much interested in. I’ve previously ordered a doll or a book for each child. Tell them that I feel that would be a needless extravagance. If they are absolutely without necessities let them notify me, and I’ll send them a check. But now is. no time to waste money on mere toys. Let the youngsters make dolls out of sticks and things. They will enjoy them just as much.” Nancy wrote these and a. dozen or so similar letters that Mr. Harrow dictated, and gave no inkling of her own attitude toward the contents of the letters. That night, when Harrow had left rather earlier than usual, the letters, were still on Nancy’s desk, and when she left, a little later, the letters were lying In a mail basket where it might seem that they had been forgotten, but where, as a matter of fact, there was no danger of their being mailed. Nancy hurried from the office to the nearest public telephone booth, called up Clarice and told her she wanted to see her at once and would board the next car toward her house. She hurried to Clarice’s room and talked with her for a short ten minutes, and then hurried home, leaving Clarice ample time for a more than ordinarily elaborate toilet that night. When Mr. Harrow arrived at the Wardham house an hour later, for dinner and a quiet little evening with Clarice afterward, Clarice was In her most bewitching mood and Harrow had nothing of the gruffness that had characterized his manner at the office during the afternoon. He had come w’lth the half conviction that that night he would definitely ask Clarice to marry him and demand from her a definite answer. But when he fell under the charm of her coquetry, for Clarice was irresistible that night, he was full determined, and he was Impatient of the many courses of dinner and the moments that had to be spent with Clarice’s family before they could gracefully find a sequestered spot alone. When they were seated in the music room—Clarice had made an excuse of wishing to show him some new records —he asked her point blank and without wasting time In preliminaries whether she would marry Mm. Clarice looked perplexed. “I’m afraid we ought not to think of it,” she said; “at least, while the war lasts. It would mean to give each other a great deal of love, and, owing to war conditions, we ought not to give all that, do you think so?” Mr. Harrow for the first time that evening recalled his afternoon at the office, and the man that had dictated the letters seemed now like a repulsive shadow of his true self. Clarice explained her friendship for Nancy Smith and Nancy’s hurried call that afternoon, “Don’t think the less of Nancy for it, begged Clarice. “I asked her to let me know just what sort of man you are, and wouldn’t let her tell you that she knew me. It is all my fault.” “If she realized how small I was in writing those letters why didn’t she tell me?” demanded Harrow. “Why did she post them?” “She didn’t post them,” said Clarice. “They are locked in your office.” It was a thoroughly contrite, humbled sort of man that knelt before Clarice’s chair. “If I’ll promise to give twice as much this Christmas, and promise never to be a spug again, will you promise to marry me?” he begged. And of course Clarice said “yes."

Birth of the Elephant.

First use of the elephant as a symbol of the Republican party was in 1874, when Thomas Nast, the first of the celebrated political cartoonists of America, made the “ponderous pachyderm” the G. O. P. emblem. Nast was born in Bavaria September 27, 1940, and came to America at the age of six. In the early sixties he went to Italy and was with Garibaldi as an artist for British and American newspapers. As political cartoonist for a popular weekly, he achieved an international reputation, and his. cartoons were said to have been largely responsible for the downfall of the Tweed ring in New York? In 1874 Nast drew a cartoon representing an elephant labeled “Republican Party.” about to fall into a chasm. Niist also depicted the democratic party as a fox. but later the donkey was substituted by the cartoonist of opposite political faith, and this has been the democratic emblem ever since. Nast died in Ecuador in 1902.

New Telephone Device.

Of the many devices which have from time to time been Introduced for improving the telephone or for permitting the user the free use of his hands, one of the latest, says the Scientific American, appears to be in every way ideal. It consists of a sound chamber over which can be placed the usual telephone receiver, and a bifurcated tube ending in ear pieces. So in uSe the telephone receiver is removed from the hook and placed on the sound chamber, while, the ear pieces are placed in the ears: and the user, talking in the normal tone, can carry on a conversation with a party at the other end of the telephone line without holding the receiver or stand. Furthermore. by splitting the sound and distributing it to the two ears: all exnoises are shut out and the conversation becomes much clearer.

THE EVENING REPUBLICAN. RENSSELAER. IND.

New Separate Skirts With Tunics

The separate skirt has made a permanent -place for Itself among the things looked for with the return of each spring, like the robins and leaves. It Isn’t a question any more of whether or not we will have separate skirts, but how we will have them. Judging from those now before the eye of the buying world we are to have them with tunics. The. tunic is the center of interest on the new model, and It Is a tunic amplified and intricate that i moves In devious ways Its wonders to i perform. Unlike the skirt In spring suits the • separate skirt is not very narrow, •those in silk are cut rather full. The (over drapes, or tunics are almost alJways uneven In length and draped in 'unusual ways. Two somewhat eccentric and wholly original examples of |the new tunic skirts are shown In the picture. We may wear skirts of silk, fibersilk, or cotton, and have them full,

It has come to be the fashion to begin wearing in January millinery that takes note of the coming of spring and ignores the bitter fact that the thermometer sticks around the zero mark with a cruel persistence. Some women even wear a straw hat in defiance of weather that compels them to fortify themselves against it with heavy fur coats. Others choose cheerful, demi-season hats that seem to be designed for any climate, they do not belong definitely to any season. In this new spring song of millinery that makes Itself heard everywhere in January, they are the Important and sustaining theme. A group of three of these first hats of spring Is pictured above. Women who are going south may choose any one of the three with the assurance It'will bear comparison with any of the hats it will meet. Women who are not going, or whose'stay will be brief, may select two out of the three, and wear them anywhere. The hat at the top Is made of dark purple violets, over a frame that Is Covered with purple satin. It is just a mass of flowers crowded together, with a sash afad bow of purple velvet Mned with cerise satin tied about IL It looks no more out of place In the midst of Northern snows than the violets in the florist’s window, and is just as refreshing to look aL The hat at the right Is of varnished black milan braid, faced with black taffeta silk. It has a crushed sash and a generous bow of many loops made of

Meeting Spring Halfway

with a clear conscience. There are enough fabrics of this kind to go around, even when skirts are a long way around, without depriving the government of anything It needs for the soldiers and sailors. Therefore the skirt at the left may be excused for hanging in ample folds at the back and sides with somewhat less fullness at the front plaited Into a yoke. The over drape Is one of many that is shorter in the back than in front. There is an odd girdle of the silk that is narrow at the back and widens to pointed ends at the front, where it fastens with button and buttonhole. The skirt of taffeta in navy blue and white shows odd, tapering streaks of white on the blue ground. This is a favored color combination for spring. It has a short plaited tunic that falls over longer side draperies of the silk and a wide girdle, also of silk like the skirt, fastening at each side of the back where the tunic drapery is arranged in a double box plait.

taffeta ribbon. For style and a. round usefulness the Southern tourist will find this little black hat equal to almost any demand. At the left is one of those weatherproof novelties which may be worn anywhere. It is made- of strips of patent leather—that is, millinery patent leather —which is light and pliable, braided in narrow strands. The shape is covered with these strands and the hat Is faced with black taffeta. An ornament which looks like a pair of narrow wings is made of rain-proof melines braid with the patent leather. There are other lovely hats of this fabric put on plain over the frame and faced with colored silk: They are usually trimmed with flat embroidered motifs tacked to the crown. Rainproof hats and garments these days have to be more than rainproof—they must also be beauty-loving world demands this.

Plaited Collars.

The latest effects Jn plaited collars of fine muslin show deep hemst Ached frills falling from a high, close neckband and fastened in front with little narrow, close ties of the hemstitched muslin, rounded on the ends. The accompanying cuffs have no plaiting, but are merely bands, like the ties, to be drawn around the frock sleeve at the wrist and tied, in crisp little bows.

DEATH ON GALLOWS

Modem German Pirates Deserve Fate of Buccaneers of Old. Sailors Serving on ..United States Merchant Marine Today Knew Man Who Remembered Fate of Spanish Freebooters. Stories of piratical methods employed by German submarine commanders in burning undefended merchant vessels and mistreating defenseless crews are no novelty to thousands of mariners on the Atlantic coast, such as are now enrolling for service in the new merchant marine. Some of these sailors, who are to man the emergency fleet of merchant ships being constructed for the United States shipping board to take supplies to our armies in France, actually knew men who suffered at the hands of the last pirates of the Spanish main, whose methods were similar, to those of the Germans. Among the men who reported for duty as mates recently at the recruiting headquarters of the shipping board were some from the Massachusetts coast who had known a survivor of the last ship taken by Spanish pirates of the Caribbean. This was CapL Thomas Fuller of Salem, who died in 1906 at the age of ninety-four. Captain Fuller was able seaman in the crew of the brig Mexican of Salem in 1832 when, laden with saltpeter and tea, with $20,000 in silver stowed under the cabin floor, she sailed from her home port for Rio. On August 29, near the coast of Cuba, the schooner was held up by a vessel described as “a long, low, straight topsail schooner of about 150 tons, painted black,” which hailed and requested the captain of the Mexican to send a boat alongside with his papers. The boat was sent, and came back in charge of an ill-looking armed crew of pirates from the Spanish main, who drove the crew of the Mexican below decks, fastened down the hatches, and began looting the vessel. Finding the silver, they sent it aboard their own ship. The pirates next cut the sails and rigging of the brig to pieces and started a fire In the galley on deck, which they expected would soon destroy the brig. They then departed for their own vessel, and sailed away in search of other victims. But they had neglected to fasten down the cabin skylight. Through this the brig’s captain crawled, and, getting to the fire, splashed water on it until he had it in control. He then caused it to smoke heavily until the enemy was out of sight. The crew rerigged their vessel, and favored by a gale made their escape from such a dangerous neighborhood. Salem sailors today recall with satisfaction that the long arm of justice meted out retribution to the pirates. A few months later a Salem vessel was in the harbor of St. Thomas, when a low, black schooner anchored near her. The Salem captain was suspicious, and Inventing an excuse went aboard the schooner for a call. On her deck he saw two spare painted black which he recognized as belonging to the Mexican. That night the stranger left the harbor, but the Salem captain notified a British man-of-war captain of her character. A few months later the British brig-of-war Curlew caught the black stranger in the Nazareth river, a slaving locality on the west coast of Africa. The pirate crew fled to the shore and found shelter with a native. They were hunted hard, and four were taken. Later 11 others were taken at Fernando Po and St. Thomas. The. pirates were conveyed to Boston for trial, and found guilty of the attack on the Mexican. Their captain. Pedro Gilbert, assumed innocence and the air of an injured gentleman. He was found guilty, with four others. In sentencing the five to death. Judge Joseph Story used language that reduced the court to tears, closing with these words to the condemned men: “And in bidding you, as far as I can presume to know, an eternal farewell, I offer up my. earnest prayer that Almighty God may in his Infinite mercy and goodness have mercy on your souls.” The five men were hanged in Boston, and with their exit piracy ended in the western world. .

How They Became Sammies.

It has been reserved to the Paris Figaro to. discover, in the American slang dictionary, the “true” origin of thb term “Sammy” as expressive of the American “Tommy,” says the Christian Science Monitor. The expression did not originate In France, but at West Point, in 1870, when a certain Lieutenant Mills was manager of the mess. The fare included some formidable sandwiches of bread and molasses. Only the cadet who had consumed six of these substantial sandwiches in succession was allowed to bear the appellation of “Sammy All of which sounds like a very plausible attempt, on the part of the French poilu, to disclaim credit for the cognomen which caused so much dissatisfaction with the American troops when it was first heard at a French landing port.; ,

Can Now Buy Single Shoes.

Single shoes have been put on sale In London, marked at special price* This has been done as a concession tc the many one-legged men discharged from the army.

WANTED TO KEEP OLD RUSSIA

Desire of Caucasian Princes# Was far Independence Without Blemishes of Industrialism. • •• ■— I met a Caucasian princess here in Petrograd, Ernest Poole writes in the Saturday Evening Post. She sat next to me one day in the small press gallery of the hall in which the duma used to meet Now in its place was the council. The woman by my side, I learned, was here as a correspondent for a social revolutionist paper down in the Caucasus. I had been in the Caucasus years before, and we spoke of the old town where she had been born, high up in the heart of the mountains. The Russians call the women there “the diamonds of Russia,” and this woman was one of these. I was curious to learn what had drawn her to a scene like this, so many thousand miles from home. She explained that her husband had been killed in the first year of the war and that after that she had thrown herself into war activities. “We don’t want to desert the Russian cause. We are all in favor of pushing the war through to the end,” she told me. “And at the same time we are doing our part In the work of the revolution. The president of the council here, and half the other leaders, too, are Caucasians. We are doing our share. But at the same time we want to be free from too much rule by Petrograd.” “What do you mean by autonomy? How free do you want to be?” I asked. “Tell me about your United States. Ton have states, and a nation, too,” she said. I tried to explain the relations between our states and the federal government. . “We wish more than that,” she said; “we want more independence.” I replied that in America we were moving just the other way—toward more centralized government —Wd 1 tried to explain how the growth of rallroaas, factories, mills and huge Interstate corporations was forcing us to grant more and more control to the men in Washington. “But,” she rejoined, “we don’t want an ugly land of mills. We want o’ir Russia to stay as it is—l mean with Its beautiful fields and its forests, Its rivers and its mountains. You have seen the Caucasus and I know you will feel what I mean.”

Among the War Sacrifices.

There are many varieties of human beings in New York city, mostly beyond the draft age, who, If Uncle Sam had to depend upon them for assistance, would never have to take an obesity cure. They all, however, believe themselves patriotic because they are stinting on their hobbles. For Instance, there is the pallid young man with the chicken breast, who is doing his bit by cutting down his smoking to ten packs of cigarettes a day. He can’t wear khaki because they can’t make a uniform small enough to fit him. Then there Is the stanch patriot who gives everything—-his good will and moral Support. He has a padlock on every pocket and he helps the Red Cross and other charities by bestowing an encouraging smile on the solicitors. He is tighter than a clam with lockjaw. The last, but not the least is the fickle young girl who just can’t knit and who can’t bear to look i at Red Cross and recruiting posters because they remind her of the struggle on the other side. “Goodness, a girl must have some pleasure these times,” she says. To forget the war she cabarets every night with the chicken-breasted young man who aids the cause of democracy by conserving on cigarettes.

Sparrow Pies.

Jacob Riis describes in one of his delightful essays how the good old housekeeper In his Danish home used to climb to the eaves to rob the sparrows’ nests for a delectable pie. Now Mr. James Hunt of Philadelphia, who is crusading against the English sparrow, advocates the pie as the true destiny of the sparrow. He furnished the sparrows for such a pie opened in Washington recently at a luncheon served by the Philadelphia Public Ledger. The guests declared that the pie was good, and the flavor of the sparrow was superior to chicken and equal to partridge. Washington boys found this out long ago in their secret sparrow roasts, where dozens of these tidbits were spitted on wires before the blaze and devoured by these food pirates. Cleaning a sparrow is a simple matter of cutting the breast away from all • other parts and skinning. Special trapa are used for catching sparrows. These are set near favorite rookeries and dozens of sparrows are caught at a time.

Royal Regalia Now In Museum.

Hawaii’s famous royal standards and robes of feathers made probably their last api>earance in a public ceremony at the recent burial of ex-Queen Liliuokalanl In Honolulu. The feather relics, regarded'by the natives as sacred, are kept in the Bishop museum, founded in memory of Mrs. Charles R. Bishop, who was the Princesit Bernice Pauahi, last in direct line of the det scendants of Kamehameha, a king whose name his people pronounced with accent on the second "meh.” The most valuable of the feather pieces la, of course, the royal robe of Kamehar ' meha the Great, for which the gathering of the feathers alone is said to have taken 100 years and to have cost $1,000,600.. This mantle was last worn by Kamehameha H and later, on state occasions, was placed over the throng