Indianapolis Times, Volume 34, Number 20, Indianapolis, Marion County, 4 June 1921 — Page 4

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Jtotfema flails QTt xm INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA Daily Except Sunday, 25-29 South Meridian Street. Telephones—Main 3500, New 28-351 MEMBERS OF AUDIT BUREAU OF CIRCULATIONS. .. . _ ( Chicago. Detroit. St. Louis, G. Loga'n Payne Cos. Advertising offices ) y ew \ or fc t Boston, Payne. Burns A Smith. Inc. PERHAPS Mayor Jewett was not so much interested in the Sowdors gambling case when it reached the Criminal Court for reversal. THERE ARE 299 more chances of not being able to keep on the right Bide of the law since the acts of the last Legislature went into effect THE QUESTION agitating the Statehouse seems to be whether the emergency compensation fund was created to compensate for political or State work! JUST WHY the county officials are so reluctant to bring Edward Stevens back here for trial is one of the questions that i3 no nearer a solution than the question of just why they allowed him to depart THE ONLY TROUBLE about Mayor Jewett’s belated efforts to make the street car company do as he wishes now is that he lost that power when the Legislature gave the company the right to surrender its franchise.

Vain Yelps! The various statements issued and In process of Issuance from the various members of the city administration relative to the city’s future relationship with the street car company are entertaining as light summer reading, but no one who has any competent grasp of the situation will consider them at all seriously. The street car company has been for many years operating under the provisions of a contract made between the city and itself under an expressed delegation of power from the State to the city to make such a contract. Comparatively recent laws, enacted by the State, have recalled the power of the city to contract with the utility, provided a legal method for the abrogation of the contract and vested the authority over sucE contractural relationships in another State agent—the public service commission. The street car company has arranged to avail itself of the legislative enactment that makes it possible to abrogate the contract made between it and the city when the city had the power to make 6uch a contract. Now, the city administration, which appears to have been de.ul from the shoulders up while all these changes in the laws of the State were being made, is ranting about Its "sacred rights," “fighting to the last ditch" and prating of a “new contract to be negotiated with the company." The gentlemen who guide the legal affairs of the street car company are not dense enough to fail to realize when they have the whiphand of a situation. They would indeed be poor lawyers if they did not realize and advise their clients that from the moment the old franchise was surrendered the public service commission becomes the sole representative of the State with whom they should, or may legally enter into contractural relations. Mayor Jewett and his corporation counsel will not succeed in negotiating anew contract with the street car company. They may, if it is agreeable to the company, draft and ratify a document embodying the present intentions of the street car company as to service, but such a document will be nothing more than balm to the somewhat outraged feelings of the city administration at finding that the time has passed when it has any control over the street car company. The present assortment of bombastic Interviews which are issuing from the city hall, together with the dire threats of what the city administration is going to do to the street car company are so palpably for political consumption as to be almost stupid. The time has passed when the city administration can do anything to the street car company. The time is here when the public service commission can take the street car company in hand, protect it from the pirates who have done everything except bankrupt it and transform it from a political football into a serviceable public utility. Os course the News-Jewett crowd will yelp over the loss of its ability to control the street car situation. It will yelp because the company has succeeded in getting out from under a franchise with which the News-Jewett crowd never was willing to make it comply except for political purposes. It will do this yelping regardless of the fact that only a few years ago it was yelping because the company had not surrendered this franchise. But those persons whose good faith Investment in traction securities has been Impaired to gratify the personal ambitions of one unscrupulous and power-loving stock manipulator who once boasted of his intent to drive certain capital from Indianapolis will soon realize that tbe pack is yelping in vain. Better street car service for Indianapolis Is in sight. It will be realized when the much abused power of a little coterie of politicians over a vital public utility is completely broken. We are now passing through that travail which will end when the politicians awaken sufficiently to lea-n that the power they have so long abused has at last been taken from them.

Americanization When it is learned that Lenine, or was it Trotsky, the leaders of the Russian debacle, were for sometime residents of New York City and did not become Americanized, it may be thought that a golden opportunity to Impress the principles of liberty was lost. There are agitators who would not learn, however, and none are so dumb as those who do not care to learn. It Is refreshing, now, to note the intense loyalty of some who have adopted this country. A Mrs. Jennie Hendrickson of Wat?rville, Pa., refuses to go to Sweden to claim a share in a large fortune, stating that she is more contented with the few pennies she earns daily at a waßhtub in American than she could be in the old country. A dispatch from Kenosha, Wis., tells of the death of a cousin of former Emperor Francis Joseph, at the age of 99 years. It should be borne in mind, in thinking of any alien, that his memory ever goes over a thousand pleasant situations in his country while the native born do not have this torment When things big and little do not go righi, the American may be angry, but he does not look back to a country of earlier days whose bad points fade as the years increase their distance. The bewildering complexities of life which will ever arise, are trying enough in the language to which one is accustomed. To a foreigner Ignorance, often magnifies faults unseen by the native. So if Pennsylvania has made Americans of some of her adopted children, much is accomplished, and if Wisconsin furnished an asylum for relatives of Austrian nobility, and held their allegiance, it Is commendable. In all the Americanization work it is well to remember the golden rule and to imagine what one would do, as a pioneer in search of a living in a foreign country.

4 Militant Sex? About the last thing a mere man expects from any woman is a bit of rough house, and it is a fact that when it does come there is considerable surprisa Is it possible that the publication of arrangements for the world boxing match is creating a pugilistic spirit where the demure should predominate or may suffrage be the catch-all and take the blame? Several Instances furnish a study. A fair daughter of Eve was recently arrested in a park in Indianapolis for disorderly conduct. The police testify that she swore for ten minutes and did not repeat once, but the woman said she really was not angry at anything. The judge sentenced her to ten days in the county jail. What she would have done had she possessed any occasion to be angry, or lost a collar button, cannot appear in print. In Washington, the capital of our great Nation, a lady from Virginia took her own husband to a fashinable hotel for dinner. The check called for payment of $4.40 for a steak and the woman slapped the clerk when he tried to collect. The court fined her SIOO for assault. Every one in Washington expects the visitor to be robbed by hotels and restaurants, and they, in turn, regard the public as proper prey. Word also comes from South Norwalk, Conr., of the wife of a noted singer, who admitted she swore at a few plumbers doing a $4,000 Job in her home. This was the height of folly and can never be explained away. It probably made the abused plumbers forget their tools or caused them to smoke too much while comtemplating their sad lot, so that they could not sleep any at night and it worried them during working hours If the lady had Just used Virginian methods, it is probable that the plumber would have better understood, at least, what was meant. It may be all the fault of the gentler sex, influenced by the late constitutional amendment permitting unlimited vote in the affairs of the day. Some never will say it with flowers.

GEORGIA’S RULING

/'--v TTT'AT'n\7 Copyright, 1920, by Doubleday, Page hint I I I —l |H [XJ l< Y & Cos., Published by special arrupge■hjy • A lLvi vIV A ment with the Wheeler Syndicate, Inc.

to those who were about him during the last illness of his only child. The commissioner had been a widower for years, and his life, outside his official duties, had been so devoted to little Georgia that people spoke of it as a touching and admirable thing. He was a reserved man, and dignified almost to austerity, but , the child had come below it ail and rested upon his very heart, so that she scarcely missed the mother's love that had been taken away. There was a wonderful companionship between them, for sbe bad many of his own ways, being thoughtful anu seriouß beyond her years. One day, while she was lying with the fever burning brightly in her cheeks, she said suddenly: “Papa, I wish I could do something good for a whole lot of children!” “What would you like to do, dear?” asked the commissioner. “Give them a party ?” “Oh, I don’t mean those kind. I mean poor children who haven't homes, and aren’t loved and cared for as I am. 1 tell you what, papa!” “What, my own child?” . "If I shouldn't get well, I’ll leave them yon—not give you, but just lend you, for you must come to mannna ami me when you die, too. If you can find time, wouldn't you do something to help them, if I ask you, papa?” “Hush, hush, dear, dear child,” said the commissioner, holding her hot little hand against his cheek; “you’ll get well real soon, and you and I will see wliat we can do for them together.” But in whatsoever paths of benevolence, thus vaguely premeditated, the commissioner might tread, he was not to have the company of hig beloved. That night the little frail body grew suddenly too tired to struggle further, and Geogia's exit was made from the great stage when she had scarcely begun to speak her little piece before tbe footlights. But there must be a stageinanager who understands She had given the cue to the one who was to speak after her. A week after she was laid away the commissioner reappeared at the office, a little more courteous, a little paler and sterner, with the black frock coat hanging a little more loosely from his tall figure. His desk was piled with work that had accumulated during the four heart breaking weeks of his absence. Ills chief clerk had done what he could, but there were questions of law, of fine Judicial decisions to be made concerning the issue of patents, the marketing and leasing of school lands, the classification into grazing, agricultural, watered and timbered of new tracts to be,opened to settlers. The commissioner went to work silently and obstinately, putting back his grief as far as possible, forcing his mind to attack the complicated and Important business of his office. On the second day after his return be called the porter. pointed to a leather-covered chair that stood near his own. and ordered It removed to a lumber room at the top of the building. In that chair Georgia would always sit when she came to the office for him of afternoons. As time passed, the commissioner seemed to grow more silent, solitary, and reserved. Anew phase of mind developed In him. He con’d not endure the presence of a child. Often when a clattering vonngster belonging to one of the clerks would come chattering into the big business room adjoining his little apartment, the commissioner would steal softly and close the door. He would always cross the street to avoid meeting the school children when they came dancing along in happy groups upon the sidewalk and his firm mouth would close Into a mere line. It was nearly three months after the rains had washed the last dead flowerpetals from the mound above little Georgia when the “land shark” firm of Hamfin & Avery filed papers upon what they considered the “fattest” vacancy of the year. It should not be supposed that all who were termed "'and marks” deserve the name Many r { them were reputable men of good business character. Some of them could walk Into the most august councils of the State and say : “Gentlemen, we would like to have this and that, and matters go thus.” But. next to a throe years' drought and the boll worm, the Actual Settler hated the Land shark. The land-shark haunted the land office, where all the land records were kept, and hunted “vacancies’ —that Is. tracts of unappropriated public domain, generally invisible upon the official maps, but actually existing “upon the ground.” The law entitled any one possessing certain State scrip to file by virtue of same upon any land not previously legally appropriated. Most of tbe scrip was now In the hands of the land sharks. Thus, at the cost of a few hundred dollars,

KEEPING HOUSE WITH THE HOOPERS

ITbe Hoopers, an average American family of five, Uviug In a suburban town, on a limited Income, will ten the readers of the Dally Times bow the nany present-day problems of tu home are solved by -working on ,*“? budget that Mrs. Hooper has evolved and found practical. Follow them daily 'n an Interesting reTGw of t-eir home life and learn to meet the conditions of the high cost of living vrtth them.) SATURDAY. Except for doing the floor and polishing the furniture, the cleaning of the dining-room was not mneh of an extra Job added to the usual Saturday work, but the floor could not be waxed and put Into proper shape wlthont having the room closed for forty eight hours. Examination of the rug, too, had convinced Mrs. Hooper that it should be sent to the carpet cleaners, as It needed more renovating than Rogers’ beating In the backyard could give It. So her deciaion this morning was to clean the windows and go over the furniture with a mixture which she prepared herself and found as effective as more expensive concoctions that were for sale already prepared. She mixed a little powdered pumice stone in linseed oil to the consistency of a very wet paste. With a soft cloth dipped In this paste she rubbed over the damaged surface—always rubbing with the grain. She decided to take up the rug and send it to the cleaner*. leaving tbe floor bare for the week. Then next Saturday *he and Roger would wax the floor right after breakfast and close up the room until It was thoroughly dry. They could eat tlieir meals an the screened-ln back porch on Saturday, and on Sunday they would have a picnic in the wood*, instead of the usual dinner at home. Then by Monday the dining-room would be ready for the finishing touches of a clean rug and freshly laundered curtains. The children were beginning to be restive for a picnic and

rui;BTEE\TH WEEK. WEEKLY STATEMENT FROM MRS. HOOFER'S NOTE BOOK. Received Henry’s salary $50.00 Paid Week's Budget. Out Balance Shelter $ 6.00 Nothing $ 6.00 Food 20.00 Meat >. $3.50 Dairy supplies 4.00 Fish 75 Vegetables and fruit 5.50 Groceries 2.50 Ice 1.00 Henry's luncheons 2.5# Clothing 7.00 Pressing and cleaning Mrs. 1.00 6.00 Hooper's tailored suit..sl.oo Operating expenses 9.00 Household supplies 2.00 2d inst. for washing machine 2.50 Extras for house cleaning 75 Tuning piano 2.50 Toilet supplies 75 - .50 Advancement 3.00 Helen’s dancing lesson $0.51. Church 25 Newspapers 25 Savings 5.00 Bought wedding present.. 5.00 5.00 Nothing SSOOO $35.25 sl4/75 SSOOO (Copyright, 1921.)

JJNDIAJNA DAILY TIMES, SATUKDAI, JUJNE 4, IJSI.

(Continued From Page One.)

they often secured lands worth as many thousands. Naturally, the search for “vacancies” was lively. But often—very often—the land they thus secured, though legally “unappropriated,” would be occupied by happy and contented settlers, who had labored for years to build up their homes, only to discover that their titles were worthless, and to receive peremptory notice to quit. Thus came about the bitter and not unjustifiable hatred felt by the to 1lng settlers toward the shrewd and stldom merciful speculators who so oft n turned them forth destitute and hoi leless from their fruitless labors. The bistory of the State teems with their tagonism. Mr. Land-Shark seldom showed his face on "locations” from which he should have to eject the unfortunate victims of a monstrously tangled land system, but let his emissaries do the work. There was lead in every cabin, molded Into balls for him; many of his brothers had enriched the grass with their blood. The fault of It all lay far back. When the State was young, she felt th# need of attracting newcomers, and of rewarding those pioneers already within her borders. Year after year she issued land scrip—Headrlghts. Bounties, Veteran Donations, Confederates; and to railroads, irrigation companies, colonies, and tillers of the soil galore. All required of the grantee was that he or It should have the scrip properly surveyed upon the public domain by the county or district surveyor, and the land thus appropriated became the property of him or It, or his or its heirs and assigns, forever. In thost* day—and here is where the trouble began—the State’s domain was practically inexhaustible, and the old surveyors, with princely—yea, even Western American —liberality, gave good measure and overflowing. Often the Jovial man of metes and bounds would dispense altogether with the tripod and chain. Mounted on a pony that could cover something near a • vara” at a step, with a pocket compass to direct his course, he would trot out a survey by counting the beat of his pony's hoofs, mark his corners, and write out his field notes with the complacency produced by an act of duty well performed. Sometimes -and who could blame the surveyor?—when the pony was “feeling his oats,” he might step a little higher and farther, and In that case the beneficiary of the scrip might get a- thousand or two more acres in his survey than the scrip called for. But look at the bound less leagues the State had to spare! However, no one ever had to complain of the pony under stepping. Nearly every old survey in the State contained an excess of land. In later years, when the State became more populous, and land values Increased, this careless work entailed Incalculable trouble, endless litigation, a period of riotous land-grabbing, and no little bloodshed. The laud-sharks voraciously attacked these excesses iu the old surveys, and filed upon such portions with new scrip as unappropriated public domain. Wherever the Identification of the old tracts . were vague, and the corners were not to be clearly established, the land office would recognize the newer locations as valid, and issue title to the locator*. Here was the greatest hardship to be found. These old surveys, taken from the pick of the land, were already nearly all occupied by unsuspecting and peaceful settlers, and thus their titles were demolished, and the choice was placed before them either to buy their land over at a double price or to vacate it, with their families and personal belongings, immediately. Land locators sprang up by hundreds. The country was held up and searched for ‘vacancies'* at the point of a compass. Hundreds of thousands of dollars' worth of splendid acres were wrested from their innocent purchasers sod holders. There began a vast heglra of evicted sottlers In tattered wagons; going nowhere, cursing Injustice, stunned, purposeless, homeless, hopeless. Their children began to look up to them for bread, and cry. It was In consequence of these conditions that Hamilton and Avery hnd filed upon a strip of land about a mile wide and three miles long, comprising about two thousand seres. It being the excess over complement of the Elias lienny three-league survey on Chiqulto River, In one of the MiddleWestern counties. This 2,000 acre body of land wits asserted by them to b vacant land, and Improperly considered a part of the Denny survey. They based this assertion, and their claim upon the land upon the demonstrated facts that the beginning corner of the Denny survey was plainly identified; that its field notes called to run west 5.700 vnrns. and then called for Chlquito River; thence it ran south, with the meanders—and so on—

by next Sunday It would bo warm enough to start right after church and spend tho afternoon and early evening in the woods thut were scarcely a mile from the house. Roger and his father were spending tho entire afternoon on Saturday now In the vegetable garden, which was Just beginning to green over In places. A vory early spring almost like summer had deceived Henry into starting the garden sooner than he did usually and then an unexpected cold snap had held up proceedings for a time. But now the weather seemed really settled. The little patch of garden In tbe backyard yielded an unbelievable supply of fresh vegetables and berries and Umbered up Mrs. Hooper’s budget so effectively during tho summer months that she was able to put* a very considerable surplus Into canning fruit and vegetables and making quantities of Jelly and Jam that In turn kept her budget from being strained in the winter, when the price of meat and butter and eggs soared to almost nnrenchable heights. “I think I will go over with you and visit your dancing school class this afternoon, Helen,” remarked Mrs. Hooper, as the family finished luncheon and Henry and Roger prepared to leave for their work In the back yard garden, with Betty prancing around with her tin paU and iron spoons, ready to go with them and spend the hour until It wns time for her nap digging In the spaded earth. Helen seemed scarcely ss enthusiastic as her mother expected she would, be at this suggestion, but sbe continued: “I’ve been wanting to go ever since you started, but I’ve been so busy on Saturday afternoons that It hasn’t been possible before. I’d like to see the class go through the dancing lesson.” “Miss Wilson says I’m getting along splendidly,” volunteered Helen, “but none of tbe girls’ mothers ever come.” Helen's tone rather intimated that perhaps it wasn’t the proper thing for

and that the Chlquno River was, on the ground, fully a mile farther west from the point reached by course and distance. To sum up; there were 2,000 acres of vacant land between the Denny survey proper and Chlquito River. One sweltering day in July the commissioner called for the papers in connection with, this new location. ' They were brought, and heaped, a foot deep, upon his desk—field notes, statements, sketches, affidavits, connecting lines —- documents of every description that shrewdness and money could pall to the aid of Hamlin and Avery. The firm was pressing the commissioner to issue a patent upon their location. They possessed Inside information concerning anew railroad that would probably pass somewhere near this land. The general land office was very still while the commissioner was delving into the heart of the mass of evidence. The pigeons could be heard on the roof of the old, castle-like building, cooing and fretting. The clerks were droning everywhere, scarcely pretending to earn their salaries. Each little sound echoed hollow and loud from the bare, stone-flagged floors, the plastered walls, and the ironjoisted celling. The Impalpable, perpetual limestone dust that never settled, whitened a long streamer of sunlight that pierced the Littered window-awning. It seemed that Hamlin and Avery had builded well. The Denny survey was carelessly made, even for a careless period. Its beginning corner was identical with that of a well-defined old Spanish grant, but its other calls were sinfully vague. The field notes contained no other object that survived —-no tree, no natural object save Chlquito River, and it was a mile wfong there. According to precedent, the office would be Justified in giving It Its complement by course and distance, and considering tbe remainder vacant instead of a mere excess. The actual settler was besieging the office with wild protests In re. Having the nose of a pointer and the eye .of a hawk for the land shark, he had observed his myrmidons running the lines upon his ground. Making inquiries, he learned that the spoiler had attacked his home, and he left the plough in the furrow and took his pen in hand. One of the protests the commissioner read twice. It was from a woman, a widow, the granddaughter of Ellas Denny himself. She told how her grandfather had sold most of the survey years before at a trivial price—land that was now a principality In extent and va'ue. Her mother had also sold a part, and she herself had succeeded to this western portion, along Chiquito River. Much of U she had been forced to part with in order to live, and now she owned only about three hundred acres, on which she had her home. Her letter wound up rather pathetically: “I've got eight children, the oldest 15 vears. I work all day and half the night to till what little land I can and keep us In clothes and books. I teach my children, too. My neighbors is all poor and hat# big families. The drought kills the crops ever two or three years and then we has hard times to get enongh to eat. There is ten families on this land what the laud sharks Is trying to rob us of, and all of them got titles from me. 1 sold to them cheap, and they hui t pnid out vet, but part of them is, and if their land should be took from them I would die. My grandfather was an honest man, and he helped to build up this Stnte, and he taught his children to be honest, and how could I make it iq> to them who bought from me? Mr. rommtssloner, if you let them land sharks take the roof from over my children and the little from them as they has to live on, whoever again calls this State great or Its government Just will have a lie In their mouths." The commissioner laid this letter aside with a gl;-h. Many, many such letters he had received. He had never been hurt by them, nor had he ever felt that thev appenled to him personally. He was hut the State’s servant, and must follow Its laws. And yet. somehow. thiß reflection did not always efiminate a certain responsible feeling that hung upon him. Os all the State's officers he was supremest in his department, not even excepting the Governor Bfoad, genera! land laws he followed. It was true, but he had a wide latitude In particular ramifications Rather than law, what be followed was rulings: Office rulings and precedents. In the complicated and new question* thnt were being engendered by the State'* development the commissioner's ruling was rarely appealed from. Even the courts sustained It when Its equity wns apparent. The commissioner stepped to the door and spoke to a clerk in the other room - spoke* as he always did. as if he were addressing a prince of the blood: “Mr. Weldon, will you he kind enongh to nsk Mr. Ashe, the State school land appraiser, to please come to my office as soon as convenient 7” Ashe came quickly from the big table where he was arranging his reports. “Mr. Ashe," said the commissioner, “you worked along the Chlquito River, In Salndo County, during your last trip. I believe. Do you remember anything of the Elias Denny three league survey?” “Yes, sir. I do,” the blunt, breezy surveyor answered. "I crossed it on my way to Block IT, on the north side of |t. The road rnns with the Chlquito River, along the survey. The Denny survey fronts three mile* on the Chlquito.” “It Is claimed,” continued the commissioner, "that It falls to reach the river by as much as a mile." The appraiser shrugged b's shoulder. TTe was bv birth and Instinct an Actual Settler, and the natural foe of the landshark.

"mother to come.” but Mrs. Hooper had been for several weeks under the impression that she ought to go with Helen, and had rather hoped that other mothers wero going with their children. It had the reputation of being a very nice class. Mis* Wliaon was a delightful girl who came from the city every Saturday to teach a group of chUdren living in the neighborhood to dance. The mothers of most of them belonged to the Women's Club, and all of the little group that came to the sowing class on Fridays with Helen were being taught In the class. But Mrs. Hooper suddenly realised that all of the women were doing lust as she was—sending their children off Saturday afternoon for a couple of hours without any idea of how they were behaving, with no further restraint than Miss Wilson’s whose business was really only to teach them to dance and insist on good manners and conventional deportment Several bits of very sophisticated gossip had floated to her ears last Friday from the dining room where tho little group of girls were sewing when she had come in from tho club for tea that centered about the dancing class. This new idea that so many of the club women were advocating for selfl-deter-mination in children might be all very well, but Mrs. Hooper Intended to deveiI op Just as much of the new philosophy j in her own family ns seemed consistent with retaining proper old fashioned parental authority. Putting on her new gray trieotlne dross and the black lace bat with the silver trimmrtig which went so well with It and tho lightweight black topcoat of a past season that had been cleaned and freshened to do service for covering her few one-piece dresses when she wore them on tho street, Mrs. Hooper accompanied Helen to dancing school, feeling that one duty more had suddenly been added to motherhood—that of chaperoning. "I had no idea it would begin so soon,” said Mrs. Hooper to herself as she went down the front steps with Helen. The menu for the three meals on Sunday is: BREAKFAST. Sliced Orange. Cereal. Shirred Eggs. , Broiled Bacon. Coffee. LUNCHEON. Fried Chicken. New Potatoes. Lima Beans. Lettuce Salad. Tapioca Pudding. SUPPER. Sliced Cold Beef Loaf. Nut Sandwiches/ Banana Layer Cake. Cocoa. Wardens Wage Hunt for Game Violators Special to The Times. GREEXSBURG, Ind., June 4.—Actingon reports from Adams, Milford, Westport and other sections of Decatur County, that the ash and game laws are. being violated, the State department ! has sent three game wardens to this county, with the determination of finding and prosecuting the violators. It is understood that the wardens will appoint men in various parts of the county to patrol the streams and woods as spotters.

"It has always been considered to extend to the river,” he sail, dryly. “But that is not the point I desired to discuss,” said the commissioner. “What kind of country is this -valley portion of (let us say, then) the Denny tract?” The spirit of the Actual Settler beamed In Ashe’s face. “Beautiful,” he said, with enthusiasm. "Yalley as level as this floor, with just a little swell on, like the sea, and rich as cream. Just enough brakes to shelter the cattle in winter. Black loamy soli for six feet, and then clay. Holds water. A dosen nice little houses on it, with wlndmillg and gardens. People pretty poor, I guess—too far from market—but comfortable. Newer saw so many kids in my life.” “They raise flocks?” inquired the commissioner. “Ho, ho! I mean two legged kids,” lsuglied the surveyor; “two-legged, and bare-legged, and tow-headed.” “Children! oh, children!” mused the commissioner, as though anew view had opened to him; “they raise children!” “It's a lonesome country, commissioner,” said the surveyor. “Can you blame ’em?” “I suppose,“ continued the commissioner, slowly, as one carefully pursues deductions from anew, stupendous theory, "not all of them are tow-headed, It would not be unreasonable, Mr. Ashe, I conjecture, to believe that a portion of them have brown, or even black, hair.” “Brown and black, sure,” said Ashe; “also red.” “No doubt,” said the commisaioner. “Well, I thank 70U for your courtesy In informing me Mr. Ashe. I will not detain you any longer from your duties.” Later, in the afternoon, came Hamlin and Avery, big handsome, genial, sauntering men, clothed In white duck and-low-cut shoes. They permeated the whole office with an aura of debonair prosperity. They passed among the clerks and left a wake of abbreviated given names and fat brown cigars. These were the aristocracy of tbe landsharks, who went in for big things. Full of serene confidence in themselves, there was no corporation, no syndicate, no railroad company or attorney too big for them to tackle. The peculiar smoko of their rare, fat brown cigars was to be perceived in the sanctum of every department of State, in every committee room of the Legislature, in every bank parlor and every private caucus room in the State capital. Always pleasant, never la a hurry, in seeming to possess unlimited leisure, people wondered when they gave their attention to the many audacious enterprises in which they were known to be engaged. By and by the two dropped carelessly into the commissioner's room and reclined lazily in the big leather upholstered armchairs. They drawled a goodnatured complaint of the weather and Hamlin told the commissioner an excellent story he had amassed that morning from the Secretary of State. But the commissioner knew why they were there. He had half promised to render a decision that day upon their location. The chief clerk now brought In a batch of duplicate certificates for the commissioner to sign. As he traced his sprawling signature, "Hollis Summerfleld, Comnir. Genl. Land Office,” on each one, the chief clerk stood, deftly removing them and applying the blotter. “I notice,” said the chief clerk, “you’ve been going through that Salado County location. Kampfer Is making a new map of Salado, and I believe is platting in that section of the county now.” “I will see It,” said the commissioner.

PROBLEMS OF TOE By-Product Coking Business 8-Growth of Indianapolis Domestic Coke Business Yesterday we gave a graphic representation of the development of our domestic business in Indianapolis, showing the fluctuations by quarters in order that both the seasonal variations in demand and the effects of unusual war conditions could be clearly seen. Today we give a graphic representation of the annual tonnage development of our local trade, ignoring the seasonal variations but showing total sales by years from the begin, ning of 1914 to the end of 1920. DOMESTIC COKE SALES IN INDIANAPOLIS Tons YEARS 1914-1920 50,000 40,000 30.000 £QOOO 10000 1314 19i5 13IG 137 1918 13 3 1320 The foregoing shows a healthy growth from 18,343 tons in 1914 to 44,166 tons in 1917. In the latter year war conditions began to check local domestic business, and after-war conditions adversely affected it from the signing of the armistice to the present time. HAD IT NOT BEEN FOR THESE DISTURBING CONDITIONS, WE BELIEVE THAT OUR ANNUAL SALES IN INDIANAPOLIS WOULD NOW BE RUNNING AT THE RATE OF 80,000 TONS. Had it not been for the coal shortage, 1920 would have carried the business back fully to the 1917 level. In spite of the present depression (which curtails retail sales as well as industrial business) we believe that our local domestic coke business this year will exceed that of 1917 by several thousand tons, and will put us in a position to resume the normal development which was interrupted by the war. Our local business has not always been what we should like to have it be, but it has shown a steady upward tendency which has been encouraging. We fully recognize that our fuel must make its way slowly, in displacing other fuels in a community which is naturally influenced by proximity to soft coal mines. It would be foolish for us to become impatient with local conditions, and we are well aware that our own activity in trying to secure public action against the smoke nuisance would be looked upon with suspicion. We must be content to let the merits of our clean and economical fuel become known gradually, leaving entirely to others direct active endeavor to obtain a general abolition of the smoke nuisance. Now this entire wholesome growth of our local domestic coke business has been brought about by a sound and consistant business policy which will be explained in later statements. It is our belief that it is to the mutual advantage of the people of Indianapolis and ourselves that this branch of our business should grow, We are equally certain that any apparent growth not based on sound business principles would be of no lasting benefit to either party. I Citizens Gas Company . ■ ■ .V

A few moment* later he went to the draughtsmen’s room. As he entered he saw five or six of the draughtsmen grouped about Kampfer’s desk, gargling away at each other In pectoral German, and gazing at something thereupon. At the commissioner’s approach they scattered to their several places. Kampfer, a wizened little German, with long, frizzled ringlets and a watery eye, began to stammer forth some sort of an apology, the commissioner thought, for the congregation of his fellows about his desk. “Never mind,” said the commissioner, “I wish to see the map you are making;” and, passing around the old German, seated himself upon the high draughtsman's stool. Kampfer continued to break English in trying to explain. “Herr Commissioner, I assure you blenty sat I has not It bremedltated—sat it wass —at it Itself make. Look yon! from se field notes wass It blatted—blease to observe se calls: South, 10 degrees; west, 1,060 varas; south, 10 degrees each 300 varas; south, 100; south, 9 west, 200; south, 40 degrees west 400 • —anrl so on. Herr Commissioner, nefer would I have—” The commissioner raised one white hand, silently. Kampfer dropped his pipe and fled. With a hand at each side of his face, and his elbows resting upon the desk, the commissioner sat staring at the map which was spread and fastened there —staring at the sweet and living protile of little Georgia drawn thereupon—at her face, pensive, delicate, and Infantile, outlined In a perfect Ukeness. When his mind at length came to Inquire Into the reason of it, he saw that It must have been, as Kampfer had said, unpremeditated. The old draughtsman had been platting In the Elias Denny survey, and Georgia’s likeness, striking though It was; was formed by nothing more than the meanders of Chlquito River. Indeed, Kampfer’s blotter, whereon his preliminary work was done, showed the laborious tracings of the calls and the countless pricks 'of the compasses. Then, over his faint pencilling, Kampfer had drawn in India ink with a full, firm pen the similitude of Chlquito River, and forth had blossomed mysteriously the dainty profile of the child. The commissioner sat for half an hour with his face In his hands, gazing downward, and none dared approach him. Then he arose and walked out. In the business office he paused long enough to ask that the Denny file be brought to his desk. He found Hamlin and Avery still reclining in their chairs, apparently oblivious of business. They were lazily discussing summer opera, it being theii habit—perhaps their pride also—-to appear rupernaturally indifferent whenever they stood with large Interests Imperilled. And they stood to win more on this stake than most people knew. They possessed inside Information to the effect that anew railroad would, within a year, split this very Chiquito River valley and send land values ballooning all along its route. A dollar under thirtythousand profit on this location, if it should hold good, would be a loss to their expectations. So, while they chatted lightly and waited for the commissioner to open the subject, there was a quick, sidelong sparkle in their eyes, evincing a desire to read their title clear to those fair acres on the Chlquito. A clerk brought in the file. The commissioner seated himself and wrote upon it in red ink. Then he rose to his feet and stood for a while looking straight

out of the window. The Land Office capped the summit of a bold hill. The eyes of the commissioner passed over the roofs of many houses set in a packing of deep greefi, the whole checkered by strips of blinding white street*. The horizon, where his gaze was focussed, swelled to a fair wooded eminence flecked with faint dots of shining white. There was the cemetery, whCre lay many who were forgotten, and a few who had not lived in vain. And one lay there occupying very small space, whose childish heart had been large enough to desire, while near its last beats, good to others. The commissioner’s lips moved slightly as he whispered to himself: “It was her last will and testament, and 1 have neglected it so long!” The big, brown cigars of Hamlin and Avery were fireless, but they still gripped them between their teeth and waited, while they marvelled at the absent expression upon the commissioner's fac*. By and by he spoke suddenly, and promptly. “Gentlemen, I have Just Indorsed the Elias Denny survey of patenting. This office will not regard your location upon a part of it as legal.” He paused a moment, and then, extending his hand as those dear old-time ones used to do In debate he enunciated the spirit of that ruling that subsequently drove the landsharks to the wall, and placed the seal of peace and security over the doors of 10,000 homes. “And, furthermore,” he with a cle'-r, soft light upon his face, “it may Interest you to know that from this time on this office will consider that when a survey of land made by virtue of a certificate granted by this state to the men who wrested it from the wilderness and the savage—made In good faith to their children or innocent purchasers —when 6ueh a survey, although overrunning its complement, shall call for any natural object visible to the eye of man, to that object it shall hold and be good and valid. And the children of this State shall lie down to sleep at night, and rumors of disturbers of title shall not disquiet them. For,” concluded the commissioner, “of such is the kingdom of heaven.” In the silence that followed, a laugh floated up from the patent-room below. The man who carried down the Denny file was exhibiting It among the clerk*. “Look here,” he said, delightedly, “tha old man has forgotten his name. He'* written, ‘Patent to original grantee,’ and signed it ‘Georgia Summerfleld, Comr.* ” The speech of the commissioner rebounded lightly from the impregnable Hamlin and Avery. They smiled, rose gracefully, spoke of the baseball team, and argued feelingly that quite a perceptible breeze had arisen from the east. They lit fresh, fat, brown cigar*, and drifted courteously away. But later they made another tiger-spring for their quarry in the courts. But the court*, according to reports in the papers, “coolly roasted them" (a remarkable performance, suggestive of liquid-air didoes), and sustained the commissioner’s ruling. And this ruling itself grew to be a precedent, and the actual settler framed it, and tanght his children to spell from It. and there was sound sleep o’ nights from the pines to the sage-brush, and from the chapparal to the great brown river of the north. But I think, and I am sure the commissioner never thought otherwise, that whether the meanders of the Chlquito accidentally platted themselves into that memorable sweet profile or not, there wa brought about “something good for a whole lot of children,” and the result ought to be called “Georgia's Ruling.”