Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 141, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 June 1918 — PASSING OF MR. JOHNSTON [ARTICLE]

PASSING OF MR. JOHNSTON

By ISOBEL FIELD

< of the Vigilantes. The traditional Englishman, he of the eyeglass and the haw-haw manner, has been thrown into the discard. The last four years have changed our views on many things and today when we think of a Britisher it is not as we used to see him, in caricature, but as be is, a simple, likable, friendly and **a first-class fighting man."

Another figure has gone, never to return: the dancing, bowing, frog-eat-ing Alphonse, the very opposite in every particular to the real Frenchman we have come to know, whose very name is the personification of valor. Guiseppe, he of the organ and monkey, with a stiletto in his belt and a plate of macaroni in the near distance, is displaced by a bold Alpini fighting in the clouds, or a dashing, gallant Bersegllere defending his country to the last drop of his blood. There is a personage nearer home that we must be prepared to lose, Mlstah Johnston, the Darktown coon. He is no more. Gradually there has appeared in his place a stern young American, trained and alert, musket in hand. There is no hyphen to his name. His forefathers were Africans, but he is loyal United States. When the colored troops marched down Fifth avenue for the last time before going to France, the, newspapers reported that they were given a “tumultuous ovation.” , As a matter of fact, there was little cheering. The dense .masses that lined the side-walls - and filled the windows and overhauging balconies looked on in growing wonder. Here and there a patter of gloved hands or a “bravo” was drowned in the beat of drums and the tramp of many feet. The sight of the long, long line of khaki-clad figures marching like clock-work; the strange grim faces that might have been cast in bronze- —eyes straight ahead, with not a side glance or a gleam of white teeth; company after company led by smart, soldierly colored officers, all on their way to the battlefront, was too awe-inspiring for noise. The crowds gave them the deeper homage of breathless surprised silence. They came to applaud Mlstah Johnston and beheld in his place a bold warrior who commanded their respect and admiration.