Indianapolis Times, Volume 44, Number 81, Indianapolis, Marion County, 13 August 1932 — Page 4

PAGE 4

M t * I P P J - H O*V AM D

The Sales Tax Threat Every citizen is interested in the threat of the special session of the legislature to legalize a sales tax as a way of supporting state and local governments. The argument advanced is that the present forms of taxation will not bring in enough revenue to keep the government functioning. The legislature has fixed definite limits as to expenditures. It is attempting to say that every city shall reduce its expenses by a definite percentage. That law is bad, of course. In such cities as Indianapolis where there is no hint of waste or extravagance and where economy is practiced, the new lav. may mean a serious deflation of official activities that Will leave the community unprotected. There are some expenses of government that no mayor can reduce. The interest on debts is fixed. There is little that can be done in the saving of money for supplies furnished to the hospitals. Nothing can be done about water and electric bills, if the city is to be protected against disastrous conflagrations and to keep its streets lighted at night. Under the former administrations, cuts could have been made without seriously threatening the welfare of the city. But that period is over. The waste has been eliminated. The arbitrary tax reduction, coupled with the policy of turning over all tax matters to the state tax board, means that there is likely to be a chaotic condition next year. It is quite possible that the police force must be cut to a point where it is no protection against crime. It is possible that the first department may not have funds to run and that the schools will be compelled to shorten their school year considerable. But now that the damage is done, the tax lobby is bent on preventing an income tax. That is the real reason for the proposed sales tax. The income tax has wide indorsement. It has the merit of taking money from those who have it. But the sales tax is levied for the most part against the wage and salary workers. It will raise the price of everything that is consumed in the home. States which have tried the sales tax do not find It a success. It breeds discontent, perhaps because of its stupidity and costliness of operation. , Taxes on incomes can be justified. They measure the ability to pay. Naturally the overly comfortable do not like it. The sales tax is their preference. The time Is short. If you happen to know any of the members of the legislature, you might tell them what you think of the plan to soak the poor in these desperate times and relieve the burdens of the rich. “The Aimless Army’ The United States children's bureau rightly is aroused over a situation that is bringing a harvest of social evils. An “aimless army” of 300,000 bdys, plied loose from home life and driven by the depression to wander about the land as box car hoboes, “bindle-stiffs,” “hitch-hikers” and “flivver tramps,” is a prey to forces of degeneration. After a national study, the bureau finds that, unlike the usual transients, most of these “are young men and boys who normally would be at work or in school.” Communities, unable to care for their own, have relapsed into “the vicious practice of ‘passing on,’ due to the sheer inadequacy of local resources.” The resulting hardships and hazards are frightful. We read that many are killed and maimed in boarding freight cars. Disease, vermin, filth, perversion are rife. Many eat nothing but a meager ratio of coffee, bread and beans. Their “homes” are the “jungles,” their companions and teachers are criminals and degenerates. It is useless to blame the communities for this condition. But it is criminal to do nothing about it. The remedy appears to lie in two channels of endeavor. The first Is to see that the young wanderers get ample food, adequate housing and medical care. The second is to do everything possible to keep them anchored—restored to home or. given anew- home. Projects such as reforestation camps offer a means of wholesome outdoor work for adventurous young men. Squalid conditions themselves will help to rob “the open road” of Its glamor if the boys are given a decent alternative. The communities' job is to make their homes livable and to prevent disastrous migrations. This will cost effort, co-operation and money. But whatever the cost, it will be cheaper than the aftertnath of crime. Kinty On Monday. Rin Tin Tin of Hollywood lay down, looked trustingly Into his master's eyes, and died. He had reached the ripe old age of 14 and was a bit tired after thirteen years of hard work. But, like John Drew, Sir Henry Irving, Joseph Jefferson, and other great actors, he died on the job. He was about to start on the first of four films starring him as hero. was a creature of Intelligence, a great actor, and a great dog. He died a millionaire and one of Hollywood’s two most popular actors. His going will bring an ache to the hearts of admiring millions of fans. If there is an eternal stage set aside for dogs. Rinty has gone there in glory, to chase cats and villains and to bask in the applause of angel audiences. We are glad his Rinty Jr., survives to carry on the noble tradition. Background Workers “A man can do a great deal of good in this world if he is willing to let someone else get the credit lor it.” We have seen that admirable saying itself credited to the late John Morley—and others. Probably the man who actually said it first never got the credit for it, and so Illustrates part of its truth. But whoever "owns” it, how equally and without bitterness it belongs forever to hosts of cheerfully toiling men and women. Permanent undersecretaries who carry on the real work of government offices, whose resplendent “chiefs” come and go and get all the glory. Scientific workers in laboratories who accumulate the data and do the patient experimenting from which some inventor strikes the spark and becomes Immortal. Background diggers feed statesmen’s minds and help prepare the speeches and projects hailed as “epoch-making ” Sometimes these dim toilers emerge and themselves become famous. But many of them lack the “limelight gift” and go on doing useful work that earn no reward in the headlines. Without envy, without m&ce, without the discon*

The Indianapolis Times <.\ BCBirrs-nowAßn >ewspapeb> Owned *nd published dally (except Sunday) by The Indianapoll* Timet Publishing Cos.. 214-220 Weil Maryland Street. Indlanapolia. Ind. Price In Marion County 2 cents a copy; elsewhere. 3 cents—delivered by carrier. 12 cents a week. Mail subscription rates in Indiana, $3 a year; outside of Indiana, 63 cents a month. B°rb> oublSxl KOI w Howard. eabl and. baker. Editor President Business Manager PHONE—Bllcy BSSI. SATURDAY, AUG. U, IMS. Member of United Prese Seri ppg-Ho ward Newspaper Alliance. Newspaper Enterprise Association. Newspaper Information Service and Audit Bureau of Circulations. “Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way."

tent that slows up effort, they “do a great deal of good in this world,” regardless of who gets the credit. And honor to them, to their genuine if uncelebrated achievements, to their unflagging zeal and courage! Good Signs Seasons, of stress call for boldness, decisiveness, clarity, frankness, directness. Often, during the last four years, we have criticised President Hoover for indecision. We have criticised Governor Roosevelt on the same ground. While disagreeing with President Hoover on many of the policies enumerated in his speech of acceptance, we are glad to note a quality of positiveness in that speech-a quality that is new, refreshing, and reassuring. On the same day, Governor Roosevelt stepped into the opening of the Walker trial with quite the same decisiveness as that which characterized the Hoover speech. We sincerely trust that Roosevelt will demonstrate the same trait in his campaign utterances, and that Hoover will continue as he has started. The times cry out against the side-stepper and the pussyfooter. * * ♦ In no part of his speech did Hoover more strikingly display that tendency away from the negative and into the positive than in his discussion of prohibition. Pour years ago what he had to say was only weasel words about “a great social and economic experiment, noble in motive and far reaching in purpose;” about “searching investigation” into something, the failure of which already was so obvious as to require no investigation. But now in 1932, Hoover comes out for a change. And some of his words are no less drastic than might have been employed on the same subject by Alfred E.' Smith. 4 We do not believe in Hoover’s program for a change. We do not believe that even the slightest trace of prohibition should remain in the Constitution of the United States. We do not believe that police regulations belong there. Complete repeal is the only final answer. But, apart from the method of the change, there can be no mistaking the fact that Herbert Hoover now is clear in his conclusion on the larger question of whether prohibition is a failure. He says: "An increasing number of states and municipalities are proving themselves unwilling to engage in such enforcement. Due to these forces, there is in large sections an increasing illegal traffic in liquor. “But worse than this there has been in those areas a spread of disrespect not only for this law, but for all laws, grave dangers of practical nullification of the Constitution, a degeneration in municipal government, and an increase in subsidized crime.” That—coming from Hoover—sounds the death knell to the domination of politics by the Scott Mcßrides, the Dinwiddies, the Bishop Canons, the Clarence True Wilsons, the Anti-Saloon League. No matter what plan may be adopted, the Republican plan of revision, or the Democratic plan of outright repeal, national prohibition as we know it is being placed in the casket. They're still arguing about whether John Hanson or George Washington was the first President of the United States. If they keep that up much longer, the only solution will, be for the supreme courts to hold the Declaration of Independence unconstitutional. A great deal has been written about the fact that the ancient Greeks didn’t use the word Olympiad in referring to the Olympic games. The whole thihg could have been avoided by the simple statement that none of our sports writers are ancient Greeks. Coolidge has announced that he'll have little part in the presidential campaign. Cal lost practically all interest in presidential campaigns shortly after November, 1924. A Hollywood movie star brags that she once remained in a hot bath for twenty-four hours. Must have been preparing for one of those hard-boiled parts. Lumbago means that the blood is poor, a doctor tells us. Or that the lawn needs mowing, we might add. A Hollywood star has been late at all four of his wedding, a gossip tells us. He ought to try a new best man. A novelist says that he frequently fails to write a single word in the first hour he works. Just another argument for the one-hour work day. In Chicago, at least, they’ll have to change the answer to the old problem asking how much Johnny receives if he works four days at $4 a day.

Just Every Day Sense By Mrs. Walter Ferguson

“T ET us.” cried the militarists, “'be prepared for -L/ every emergency.” We were. With guns, with tanks, with gas bornhs. the great United States army route dand put to flight the tattered remnants of the B. E. F. This feat probably will not go down in history as another victory of Manila bay. No chronicler will have the temerity to mention this exploit. The flag of our country forever must fly at half staff here. Yet we safely may count upon such results when armed men go forth to suppress riots, uprisings and revolts with the unarmed. For the man with a gun always will find a good excuse to use it, just as a nation with a great army will contrive eventually to get into osme kind of a war. The thing is as inevitable as election. The strength of all tyranny comes gradually with the knowledge of increased power. How much better it would have been for America if in July, 1932. our army had been unprepared. Had we put our trust in diplomacy rather than in the cavalry, this blot would not mar our record, asm AMID all the arguments, who can say where the direct blame lies? No one. perhaps. The sympathy of the country is with the soldier who was ordered to his duty, as well as with the bonus marchers. The only thing we are sure of is that a blunder has been committed, and a blunder that involves guns nearly always termintes in tragedy. Two veterans are dead who aot so long ago marched forth to fight for America, cheered on by the very militarist sentiments that the other day struck them down. Those preoccupied with the manufacture of armaments will want to utilize them. Os this you may be sure. Yes. the army always is prepared. And some of Its sallies into enemy territory are as useless and ignoble as the recent charge on Camp Anacostia. When we must pay for arms to kill our hungry countrymen, then it seems to noe that the ultimate charge against militarism has b**' l written.

THE INDIANAPOLIS TIMES

M. E. Tracy Says:

Hoover s Speech Shows That He Is the Same Phlegmatic, Slow-Moving Standpatter That He Always Was. NEW YORK. Aug. 13.—President Hoover’s acceptance speech was illogically self-satisfied and disappointingly unoriginal. He appears to have learned something about war debts from his 1928 opponent, former Governor A1 Smith, and something about prohibition I from the Democratic platform. Whether he has learned anything from the depression is not so clear. He still believes in prosperity and, having failed to preserve it, thinks the American people should give him a chance to restore it. He still sympathizes with the drys, but recognizes the necessity of being wet. Virtually all the interesting suggestions President Hoover made can be traced to borrowed ideas or changed opinions, and the changed opinions come too late to be regarded otherwise than the products of submission to pressure. One can not read w'hat the President says about changing the eighteenth amendment, or solving the debt problem, without suspecting that he vofees a synthetic viewpoint, rather than his own. As some ardent Republican editors have observed, his speech bore little resemblance to that of Governor Roosevelt. Obviously, it was not made on the spur of the moment, contained few rough spots, and had every earmark of being prepared carefully. Indeed, its studied character was so apparent as to leave the impression that it might have benefited by some collaboration, if not editing. Not that such a thing is unusual, or would reflect on the author, but that it scarcely reveals a great leader. # u u Follower, Not Leader NO matter how completely President Hoover may have changed his mind about some things, particularly prohibition, the man himself has not changed. His speech leaves no doubt on that point. He is the same phlegmatic, slowmoving standpatter that he always was, capable of readjusting his attitude when forced to do so, but somewhat prone to confuse statesmanship with politics, an engineer at heart, trying to meet emergencies by the blue print method. Such a type of mind is not to be regarded as valueless. It can be depended upon never to make the mistake of beng too radical, or impulsive. It also can be depended upon to function reliably, if not brilliantly, under compulsion. But it is powerless to move by itself. It needs the force of circumstances, or the guidance of keener intellects. Herbert Hoover never has been the man by himself that he was under Wilson. He is an able executive as long as someone else furnishes the initiative and inspiration. He can draw a wonderful set of plans after someone has given him the big idea, or do an excellent piece of work after some one in whom he has confidence has convinced him it is worth while. Copies Others’ Ideas PRESIDENT HOOVER should have been first to perceive the necessity for repealing nation-wide prohibition, and should have lent his influence to the adoption of a straightforward plank by his party. Instead, he dawdled in an atmosphere of hesitancy and bewilderment, listening to drys one day and wets the next. His advisers were split, and no group had power enough to dominate the situation. When the Democrats came out with their brief, clear statement, he caught the notion of what should be done. In the same way, he caught the notion that, while cancellation oi war debts was too unpopular to be considered, they were bound to be scaled down and that something might bp done to soften the effect by arrangements which would increase our export trade. But the original idea was not his. President Hoover seems to think that his record is the real issue in this campaign. In an academic sense, that may be right, but for practical purposes, the voters should look a little deeper. President Hoover’s record was made largely by those who had his ear, by a comparatively small group of friends, associates and advisers. That group is the real issue.

People’s Voice

Editor Times—ln your views of the people, Mrs. Martha Simpkins says she believes the young people are as well off morally and physically as they were twenty-odd years ago. I believe that at heart that they really, truly are, and only are trying to have what they call a good time. But if Mrs. Simpkins is a truly good sport, and can get some persons who know the ropes well, and go with them on an all-night trip, say for instance Saturday night, to every dance hall, roadhouse, speakeasy, cabaret, everything of the kind that is open, they can get into, and see ail that there is to be seen, by the Sabbath morning she will understand why people want beer and light wines legalized, not only for the much-needed revenue, but to save the morals of the people before it is too late. Just because she does not see these things is no reason they do not exist. People do not ask. for the saloon’s return, but the woman who passed them was no more of a by-word among the men who congregated in front of them than they now are by thq crowd in front of the poolrooms. Some of our womanhood do things today that make the rest of us blush because we are women and what some of these young girls are going to tell their children I, for one, don’t know. True, some who were confirmed | drunkards are trying to do right, but even then they did have stuff tha* was decent to drink, as such stu.> goes, but now a self-respecting hog would not drink it. READER. Is the area of the United States greater than that of Canada? Continental United States has 3,026,789 square miles, and including territories and dependencies, the total area is 3,738.395 square miles. The area of Canada is 3,690,043 square miles.

BELIEVE IT or NOT

' I - ■ ■— s> ~ Footprints and Wagon Tracks of the donner Pioneer PARTy ' ARE STILL VISIBLE ON THE GREAT SALT DESERT .. AFTER 86 YEARS/ The Donner Party crossed m 1846 on their way to California /W' * WD oßt'6ce Kama, * 73 YE ARC: OLD,CAN Til HIKSEXF INTO A KNOT ' King Fetram Syndicate. Inc. Ciw rig)** fner*i reeOVllle, O-

Following is the explanation of Ripley's “Believe It or Not,” which appeared in Friday’s Times: Eight Hundred Times Under Fire—Brigadier-General Wheeler (1836-1906) resigned a commission in the United States army to join the confederacy, where he successively was promoted to the rank of colonel, brigadier, cavalry commander of Bragg’s army, ma-jor-general and lieutenant-gen-eral. He was very conspicuous as a raider in the Civil war, having the destruction of more than $3,-

DAILY HEALTH SERVICE Stuttering Effects May Be Serious

This is the first of two articles by Dr. Fishbein on stuttering and personality. The second will appear Monday. BY DR. MORRIS FISHBEIN Editor Journal of the American Medical Association and of Hvgcia. the Health Magazine. FOR several years investigators in the University of lowa have been studying defects of speech, not only from a mechanical point of view, but also as concerns their effects on human psychology. Stuttering is not as important, as a physical disability, as would be the absence of sight or of hearing or the loss of limbs. It is, however, a focal point for several disturbances of life and living which may lead eventually to emotional states that bring sorrow both to their possessors and to the associates of their possessors. Some authorities differentiate between stuttering and stammering. However, any disorder in the rhythm of verbal expression which speech halting and difficult may be taken as a phenomenon of this type. In a recent Investigation in the University of lowa, 80 stutterers ranging in age from 7 to 42 years •were examined carefully. It was found that men outnum-

IT SEEMS TO ME

THERE used to be a person | called a parlor Socialist, but he has gone—never to return, I hope. His place has been taken by the parlor Communist. This young man or woman looks over the parapet after the second cocktail and remarks, “If I were going to be anything, I'd be a Communist.” Generally he or she never decides to be anything, and so Mr. Foster’s movement is helped only in a desultory way. . However, a few of the gilded left wingers do make motions, and many write book reviews. I have at hand a report on this phenomenon from McAlister Coleman. 000 A Comrade Contributes “Tj'ROM my enforced exile in BerJr gen county, New Jersey, where, as the Chamber of Commerce says, ‘opportunity calls,’ but where, as I have discovered in the last three weeks, nobody else does, I rise to ask you where you stand on this latest hoopla among our intelligentsia? “You undoubtedly have noticed that a lot of the critical clan, new Republicans and tired humanists have come upon Karl Marx, and are shpuldering their way over to join Bill Foster's Barricade Boys. They are pretty sore at Norman Thomas, because he is not a combination of the late Daniel De Leon, Gene Debs and Jack Reed. “In the last New Republic, one of them has a piece saying that Thomas is the son of a minister, an ex-minister himself and a gentleman to boot. He also takes a sideswipe at you. “He doesn’t bring the same charges against you as he does against Thomas, but he hints pretty broadly that they may lurk in your background some shreds of respectability. Anyway, you are not proletarian, and Thomas speaks the language of labor only ‘falteringly.’ m m m Each According to Needs “T HAVE been around quite a lot 1 with jabor, Norman Thomas and yourself, and I am here to ad-

Cii request, sent with stamped addressed envelope, Mr. Ripley will furnish proof of anything depicted by him.

000,000 of United States property to his “credit.” He led the advance in every forward movement of his forces, and always covered the rear in a retreat. For a long time he fought almost daily, dismounting his force for battle when necessary. Battles connected with his name are Chickamauga, Ringgold Gap, Macon, Augusta, Savannah, Johnsonville, Bentonville and numerous others. At the outbreak of the Spanish-American war, General Wheeler went to Cuba as

ber women in the percentage of about 3 to 1. Incidentally, it is known that stuttering is more common and apparently more severe among boys than among girls. Several surveys seem to show that about 1 per cent of all school children stutter. So far as their mental ability is concerned, they seem to be approximately equal to the rest of the population. Nevertheless, they are held back in school because of their defect so that anything that can be done to help them means better progress in life and, obviously, more useful careers for them. So difficult is the life of the stutterer in school that many teachers prefer to excuse the child from oral recitation to prevent it from developing a feeling of inferiority and from suffering humiliation. A few stutterers prefer to attempt to speak, since, by their effort, they maintain a respect which otherwise they may lose. Most psychologists are convinced that it is desirable that people who stutter learn to meet as many situations as possible as they are developed in life so that enuthusiasm and contentment will prevail while resentment and despair are reduced.

mit that I don’t know just what the language of labor is. I have heard it from coal diggers who just have received a cut in wages, and it was not that of the flowers, but, on the other hand, I have heard other coal diggers take their troubles to the Lord in language that would receive the complete approval of the Methodist Board of Temperance und so weiter. “It is perhaps to be regretted, but it is nevertheless true, that all working people do not articulate in the four-letter words used by the characters in Dos Passos’ very lively ‘1919.’ In fact, many a steel worker of my acquaintance would arise and flee, with burning cheeks, the ordinary conversation among our penthouse proletarians. “And if our critic fneans that Norman Thomas should mouth Marxian maxims at the American workers—well, take a look at the luck in Communist ‘agitprops’ have had with that. “No, I suspect that the real gripe the neo-Communists have with Norman Thomas and the rest of us Socialists is that we don't fit into the picture that they carry around in their heads of the ideal revolutionist. “He is, of course, a lean, grayfaced youth, with burning eyes, thrusting a fist up into a stark sky. That seems to let you out. (Me, too, for the Daily Worker invariably refers to me as ‘red faced.’ That is all the red they will grant me.) Some day I would like to have these tough literary babies meet William Zebulon Foster. “If there ever was any one who looked like the presiding elder of the First Presbyterian church of Marion, 0., it is the same W. Z. Foster. Communist candidate for President of the United States. 0 0 * What to Do Now? “C*o, what are we to do? Ten million men and women are out of work, and a good lot of them are on the starvation line. One way out, but by no means the only way, is to use an instrument the American worker understands, namely, the ballot.

V' BertsUred O. * U 1 Patent Off lee RIPLEY

major-general of volunteers in command of a cavalry division, adding the battles of Las Guasimas and San Juan to his past laurels. Altogether, “Fighting Joe” Wheeler commanded in more than 200 battles and was under fire 800 times. He had a long and enviable record as congressman, and was a United States brigadiergeneral, retired, when he died. Monday “Astounding Chest Expansion."

Interestingly enough, it is found that stutterers who engage in athletics find in physical motion* of this character, in many instances, an outlet whereas others find themselves inhibited in their physical activities as well as in their speech. The lowa investigators report that stuttering did not seem to interfere particularly with literary work. Nevertheless, only some 15 per cent of stutterers engaged in such activities. Less than 10 per cent, however, wished to take up music,- and around 6 per cent to write, to take part in debating, dramatic acting, and oratory. Obviously, the latter performance is not one that should appeal particularly to a stutterer. Nevertheless, one stutterer finally reached the point where he was able to play the lead in a play, an accomplishment to which he always looked back as a triumph in his career. The evidence indicates that public speaking is not necessarily good treatment for stuttering. It does not seem to reduce the severity of the attacks, nor to help the stutterer in any way. Next—Social handicaps of the stutterer.

_ v lIEYWOOD BROUN

“I had thought that the organization of workers into a party of their own, with their goal the abolition of profit, rent and interest, might be of some help. I see I was mistaken. The thing is to play charades, with Norman Thomas disgusted as an oppressed garbage collector, shouting, ‘T hell wit’ yuh. you soandso!’ you following after ip the costume of an exploited Bayonne oil worker, carrying aloft a banner on which it is written in the words of Marx; “ ‘No matter how long may be the series of periodical reproductions and antecedent ac c u mulations through which the capital now functioning may have passed, it always retains its primal virginity.’ “The last line probably will get a laugh, and, as you know, a laugh among the intelligentsia is worth its weight in Mike Gold.” 000 The Language of Labor THE language of labor is a tongue in which orthodoxy is even more difficult than Mr. Coleman has intimated. My morning copy of the Daily Worker lies beside me, and I find the editor, replying to a steamfitter who thinks that the paper should print some proletarian literature in the interest of greater liveliness. The Commissar replies mournfully that only Germany and Russia are producing proletarian fiction on a large scale. There is none to be found in America. This seems to me rather a dirty dig at Comrade Dreiser, considering all that he has done and, more particularly, said for Communism. And, indeed, the Daily Worker is far too modest. I have seen many excellent items of proletarian fiction day after day in its news columns. I follow with special interest the crimes committed by one specific character, who seems to rank along with Bill Sikes and Simon Legree as one of the most complete villains in modern literature. And the author has hit upon an excellent name for Ips creation. The fellow is called Heywood Broun. (CoDrrucbt. 1932. by The Times)

Ideals and opinions expressed in this column are those of one of America’s most interesting writers and are presented without regard to their agreement or disagreement with the editorial attitude of this paper.—The Editor.

AUG. 13, 1932

SCIENCE BY DAVID DIETZ Astronomers Find That SunSpots Occur in Cycles. THE fact that sun spots occur in cycles has engaged the attention of astronomers for almost a century. Within the last few years, the work of Dr. Harlan . Stetson of Perkins' observatory, Ohio Wesleyan university, has proved definitely that radio reception improves and declines the sun spot cycles. Many authorities suspect that there may be long-time changes m our weather, which can be traced to the sun spot cycle, but this has not been established. S. H. Schwabe of Dessau was the first to discover that sun spots occurred in cycles He announced his discovery in 1843, after twenty years of study. During that time he had made an almost daily watch of the sun spots. Systematic study of sun spots was begun by Prof. Max Wolf of Zurich in 1880. He collected all observations of sun spots available up to that time and summarized them. He devised a system of counting sun spots which took into account both the groups of spots and the number of spots in the group. This method is still in use. The result of the daily count is known as the “Wolf number” for that day. u a m Eleven-Year Cycle THE sun spot cycle is approximately eleven years long. That is, it usually is that many years from a time of maximum sun spots up to a period of minimum and back again to a period of maximum. However, the time from one maximum to the next may be a longer or a shorter period. Russell states, “The average interval between maximum Is 11.13 years, according to Newcomb; but this is subject to great fluctuations, the observed intervals ranging all the way from 7.3 to 17.1 years. ‘•The rise to maximum is usually, but not always, more rapid than the fall which follows, the mean duration of the two. according to Newcomb, being 4.62 to 6.51 years.” “W. j. S. Lockyer has pointed out that the rise is more rapid both in actual duration and as compared with the fall, when the maxima are highest. “The whole length of the interval between minima, however, seems to bear little relation to the intensity of the maximum.” During the period of sun spot maximum, the sun is covered with spots daily. On some days as many as 100 spots are visible. During the period of sun spot minimum, spots are very scarce. Sometimes an entire month will pass without a spot being observed. There also is considerable variation in the intensity of sun spot maxima. Three or four cycles will, exhibit maxima of high intensity. These will be followed by several of low intensity. u n > Latitudes ANOTHER interesting fact about sun spot cycles is known as Spoerer's law of sun spot latitudes,: in honor of the astronomer who first pointed it out. Spoerer showed that when a sun spot cycle is starting, that is when a minimum just has been passed, the new cycle is heralded by the appearance of a few small spots at considerable distance from the sun’s equator. These spots occur-in latitudes 25 or 30 degrees north and south. As the cycle continues, more spots appear. In addition, many of the new spots occur in lower latitudes, that is closer to the equator. In this way, the two belts in which the sun spots occur widen out. Then as the maximum is passed, and spots become fewer in number,* they cease to appear in the higher latitudes. Consequently the sun spot belts begin to shrink In size. But the spots now are all in low latitudes. As the cycle comes to a close, onlya few spots are left, but these are a few degrees north and south of the equator. The new cycle now begins again at high latitudes. Asa rule, evidences of anew cycle are in sight before the last traces of the old one have died out completely. The result is that at a sun spot minimum there usualy are a few spots scattered in four widely separated zones. A few spots belong to the old cycle a few degrees north and south of the equator, and a few spots belong to the new cycle at distances of about 30 degrees north and south of the equator.

$ T< S& Y 0

CZECHOSLOVAKIA RECOGNIZED Aug. 13. ON Aug. 13, 1918, Great Britain recognized Czecho-Slovakia as an Independent nation. It was to be formed out of certain AustroHungarian states at the end of the war, and the recognition was made to encourage the operations of Czecho-Slovakian troops co-operat-ing with the allies in Russia. At the same time, it was announced officially in Vienna that Austrian troops were being sent to the western front to aid the hardpressed German forces there. Fresh French divisions resumed the offensive on the Oise river, driving the Gemans back for more than two miles on a wide front. British, American and French forces continued their gains in Picardy, capturing thousands of prisoners and great quantities of ammunition and equipment. German prisoners taken In the previous month were estimated at more than 100,000. or the equivalent of ten German division.

Daily Thoughts

And the pride of Israel doeth testify to his face; therefore shall Israel and Epbriam fall in their iniquity; and Judah also shall fall with them.—lfosea 5:5. * Deep is the sea, and deep is hell, but pride mineth deeper.—Tupper.