Indianapolis Times, Volume 46, Number 120, Indianapolis, Marion County, 28 September 1934 — Page 23

It Seems to Me HEYHOD BROUN /''YN’CE when I was an actor two fellow members of the cast were sitting in the dressing room discussing my frailties while I was out front doing a monolog. The more kindly of my critics said. ‘‘l don't quite agree with you. Heywood is improving—very slowly. But there's one thing he can't ever seem to learn and that's how to get off the stage." I think that General Hugh S. Johnson's weakness was much like my own. In his passing from official life I must admit a liking for the man even though he seemed to me singularly unfit for the post he held. It was not always so. The general might have retired at the end of his first three or four months in a blaze of glory. He was. and still is, I suppose, the best ballyhoo man Washington ever has seen. And I do not regard this a small gift. He

started on his crusade with an evangelical fervor. He was onehalf Bill Sunday and one-half the Captain Flagg of Laurence Stallings' "What Price Glory.” Add to this a pinch of Cromwell. There very well might have been more Cromwell and less Sunday. There was no quiet along the Potomac in the early days when General Johnson clattered up and down the great open spaces of the commerce building. He was, in himself, a brigade of cavalry. In those days many of us believed that the artillery could not be far behind. The

jl

Heywood Broun

big guns would arrive in time. The ringing words of Genera! Johnson would be made good by an actual display of force. The reasons for his retirement are numerous. They have been piling up for months, but the immediate cause seems to be the violent protests against him by union labor, and these protests are well founded. a a a Just a ‘Defense Mechanism ’ BUT let It be remembered that in the beginning General Hugh S. Johnson actually struck terror into the hearts and minds of those men who fall most readily under that easy label "the vested interests." He was a fuzzy-wuzzy, who broke the plutocratic square. Perhaps "broke" is too strong a word. He nicked it. The ranks reformed and the general never made a second successful charge. I am one of those who believe that his intentions at all times were honorable. He failed partly out of Ignorance, partly out of a fundamental weakness of character. It didn't take the tough boys very’ long to find out the general's violence of expression was what the Freudians call "defense mechanism." He frightened them at first because the performance which he put on as the uncompromising dictator of industry seemed so plausible. Few men are as eloquent as General Johnson when the spirit move* him. He is the best phrase maker of a political generation. Although it was in a husky baritone, he could make words sing and the tune was one of fervor and determination. I think the newspaper owners were the first to find him out. I believe the code which the publishers gained in Washington was the decisive defeat in the career of General Johnson. It was perhaps his most difficult problem. 000 Too Much to Learn and Unlearn HE had to deal with men who were the masters of public opinion. For just a little while he stood as one of the boldest men in America. For a week, maybe ten days, he took the attitude that he would and could tackle the united force of the American press. Then the newspaper owners began to crack down and Johnson understood for the first time precisely what that phrase meant. The rules established by the Marquis of Queensbury hardly were respected in this onslaught. Johnson gave in. From that day on he was a licked mar. There was an emptiness in even the bravest words he uttered. Perhaps thus theory which I advance is oversimplified. Hugh Johnson never understood the psychology or the philosophy of trades unionism. I don’t think he was unfriendly, as many labor leaders contended. He was just dumb. He had too much to learn and unlearn. Consider his background as an army officer and as a small time manufacturer running an open shop. It can not be said even now that he is the darling of big business. He swatted his own class vigorously for a time. And though his crusade collapsed something remained. When the history of this whole period is written I think General Johnson ought to receive credit as an early pioneer in the drive to wipe out that familiar . mug slogan "Nobody is going to tell me how to run my business.” And so over the political grave of Hugh S. Johnson I think somebody might drop a wreath. And also, of course, a dead cat. (Copyright. 1934. bT The Times)

Today s Science BY DAVID DIETZ

THE use of air conditioning in hospiffrts as a means of increasing the energy and vitality of patients, is predicted by Ur. Clarence A. Mills, professor of experimental medicine in the University of Cincinnati college of medicine. Rooms so equipped as to duplicate the coolness of the mountains or the heat of the tropics will soon play a role in the treatment of disoftsf. Dr. Mills presented his theory in a paper before the American Hospital Association, meeting in Philadelphia. The paper summarized six years of research by Dr. Mills and his associates at the University of Cincinnati. Climatic changes not only bring corresponding changes in energy levels, but also bring about differences in resistance to infection. Dr. Mills said his studies indicate. • Moist heat that depresses bodily metabolism makes for an increased susceptibility to infection and lessened ability to fight bacterial invasions once they have gained a foothold.” he said. m a a DR. MILLS even believes that a patient's birth - I place governs his ability to recover from infections. Native whites and Negroes from the north and white emigrants from northern Europe show greater resistance to infections of various kinds than those from regions of prolonged moist heat, he said. “It is almost certain that the differences are real and represent true biologic variations in ability to fight infection depending on the climatic stimulation of the patients birthplace,” he said. Summer heat waves such as those from which large portions of the United States suffered this year bring on reduced blood pressure, lessened energy and decreased ability to fight infection, he claimed. a a a THE excessive storminess of the north in winter constitutes a health hazard, in Dr. Mills' opinion, contributing to bodily and mental breakdowns. “The high death rate of the metabolic and degenerative diseases in the northern United States, I believe, is primarily due to this excessive drive.” he said. "We need summer heat waves interspersed through the winter to relieve northerners of the severe drive of that season." Since nature provides no heat waves of summer proportions in the midst of winter, Dr. Mills suggests that hospitals and sanitariums do it by means of air conditioning. Two or three seeks in a room at 90 degrees Fahrenheit and 70 per cent relative humidity would produce marked relief and might do much to lessen the eventual onset of sclerosis in the dynamic type of person." he declared. 'Properly constructed hospitals would find little difficulty in providing any type of artificial climate a physician might desire for particular purposes.” Dr. Mills will be able to broaden his studies soon, according to the University of Cincinnati, to include the effect of climate on leprosy. He has been asked to make such a survey by the Leonard Wood Memorial for the Eradication of Leprosy, New York, it was announced.

The Indianapolis Times

frU Leaked Wire Service ot the United Pres A*ociatlon

WITH AMERICA’S DRIFTING HORDE

New Social Problems Following Trails of America’s Nomads

Tbi* U the fifth of a terie* of articles written for The Tune* and NEA Werrice by a woman who became wandering hitch-hiker to surrey eonditiona amonf America’* nomads. a a a BY MISS LESLIE SHAW Written for NEA Serrice IT was my first night in a large city. It also was chilly—the first night of autumn. I came into a huge room crowded with men and boys. Some sitting on long backless wooden benches, some in huddled groups over a coal stove. They were all thinly clad, and they kept their coat collars turned up. Black faces, smudged with coal dust. Tired, blood-shot eyes, lean hungry faces, with failure written in every line. A clerk came up to me hurriedly. “The man at the intake desk would like to see you. We re short of beds as we were last night. We’ll have to make arrangements with another lodging house. Last night they slept on the floor here in the office.” In the main shelter. A large apartment building remodeled into a three-story arrangement. A huge open hall on the first floor where men and boyi milled about aimlessly. The smell of hot cakes and coffee permeatmg the atmosphere. Just off the hall was the dining room, where men bent eagerly over steaming plates.

Upstairs, the dormitories. Rows and rows of cots, double deckers, three feet apart, each with army blankets. Each man made up his own bed, being told how by the matron in charge. Old men, young men, clean and dirty men, they all looked like children as they stood in line being told how to make up their beds. Then their clothes in a bag—for the protection of the group, clothes must be deloused. And no matter how painful the process, a shower must be taken by each man. o*o a ACLINIC for the men with sore feet, with bruises and cuts. A young medical assistant in spotless white uniform bent over a blistered foot, applicator in hand. The young "Doc” by all odds was the favorite. He didn’t ply them with questions, he cared for their aches and pains, and acted interested in them. The men streamed in. The beds soon were all occupied. I was making last hour arrangements for more beds. Sharp bargaining. Twenty-five cents the limit. By 1 o’clock in the morning, the men were all sent out to some shelter or other. Next morning, interviewing a group of young boys.

- The -

DAILY WASHINGTON MERRY-GO-ROUND

■By Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen

WASHINGTON, Sept. 28. —The final showdown between Roosevelt and General Hugh Samuel Johnson came after a series of the most amazing conferences probably ever held by the President of the United States. One of the first of these was between Roosevelt, Donald Richberg and Miss Perkins. They outlined conditions inside the NRA—the gradual dropping out of its best men, the disorganization, the rapidly waning morale, the inconsistency of Johnson's policy—all pointing to

the fact that Johnson must leave or the NRA collapse of its own vacillation. And before Richberg and Perkins left, they had a flat statement from the President that the general was to be ousted. Some people thought this would be comparatively easy. Repeatedly during his stormy career as boss of the Blue Eagle, Johnson had professed his readiness to resign and go back to his “hundred thou a year.” “I thank God,” he once bellowed, "that the strength of my official position here is that I am without political ambition, and am free to close the window, whistre to the dog and Anally walk out the private door of my office any day this despicable thing becomes too much for my selfrespect to bear.” a a a BUT despite increasing criticism he refused .to budge. "Crack-downs” about which he once talked so threateningly came at him from all sides. The federal trade commission issued a report denouncing his steel code as extortionate and monopolistic. The Darrow board raked him with searing fire from head to foot. The national labor board threw 5 John Donovan, whom he had fired, back into his face. No high government official has taken it more consistently on the chin since the day Herbert Hoover stepped out of the White House. Faced with this ever-stiffening circle of opposition, Johnson swore he would "not go until this thing has jelled a damned sight more than it has yet.” a a a AND walking into the White House he put up the battle of his life. It was one of those verbal battles which few men—certainly no one around Washington—can equal. In the NRA, Johnson had been in the habit of walking into a conference room with a group of hard-boiled industrialists, asking a few pertinent questions to get the drift of the argument, and then by the sheer force of his personality, the power and choice of his vocabulary, shattering the opposition and bringing them to his viewpoint. And on more than one occasion he did this with the President. Roosevelt, it must be remembered. has been tremendously fond of his NRA administrator. No man could work like a slave, show such unquestioned loyalty and devotion as Johnson, and not touch a responsive chord in the President. Besides this. Roosevelt got a tremendous kick out of the stories, the variegated cuss-words, the turbulent life of the ex-cavalry officer. a a a SO he tried to ease him out of the picture as gently as possible. He suggested first of all an NRA board, of which Johnson could be a member. “I'm not going to have any board running me,” was the general's retort. There were other compromise offers, among them a research trip to Europe. All got the same reaction. Johnson would accept no compromise. He was going to be boss or be fired.

“Where did you spend last night?” “In a hay stack.” . . . “On a freight.” . . . "Sitting up in a restaurant.” 000 YOU knew they were physically tired, and yet they were alive, interested. Assigning them to a case worker, and the process of trying to get them stabilized, back home, or back to their communities. Runaway boys with carefully elaborated stories. One boy of 18 with a remarkable vocabulary told me that he was associated with the Smithsonian institute, that he recently had returned from Egypt and now was setting out for research in California. He had been in an airplane crash from an altitude of 15,000 feet two days before but was unharmed. He had been contributing to the institute for ten years, and had only recently found a mummy in the Shenandoah valley ... I telephoned a psychiatrist. In they streamed, day after day. More than half of them left before we could get in touch with their relatives or communities. Later on, transient camps were established in some parts of the country, with the result that a large number of men without families were for the time being stabilized.

The final straws that finished Johnson with Roosevelt came only recently. One was his reference to conferences with Justice Brandeis. This did not go down well with the President. The fact' was that a friend of Johnson took him to see the supreme court justice one day without Brandeis knowing he was coming. a a a A NOTHER straw was Johnson’s statement that textile labor leaders had violated a specific pledge to him when they declared their strike. This was flatly disproved by the President’s special textile labor board. Another thing which riled Roosevelt was Johnson’s statement that his “heart bled” for George A. Sloan, chairman of the textile institute. This came after the President had secured an explicit promise from Johnson that he would not get embroiled in the textile strike. Roosevelt also got a report on Johnson's general behavior when he made the speech and it did not go down well. Thus one of the most colorful, dynamic and at one time most genuinely useful members of the Roosevelt family gradually eased himself out of big influence in the New Deal. (Copyright, 1934. by United Feature Syndicate. Inc.) WEST INDIANAPOLIS TO HAVE FLOWER EXHIBIT Show Starts This Afternoon With Entries in 15 Divisions. Entries classified in fifteen divisions were to be shown this afternoon and tonight in the flower and vegetable show for West Indianapolis residents in the Christamore Settlement house. Miss Elizabeth Bertermann was to be in charge of the flower show, with Mrs. Erwin Vonnegut in charge of the economy table. NEGRO SHOT IN SCRAPE Wife Wounded Husband After Tiff Over Woman, Police Allege. Carl Jones, 27, Negro, 2127 Lexington avenue, is in a serious condition at city hospital today as the result of a shooting scrape last night. His wife, Mrs. Velma Jones, 26. is alleged by police to have admitted shooting her husband when she found him with another woman. Five other Negroes were arrested on vagrancy charges and held as witnesses. TRUSTY IS ACQUITTED Guard Who Killed Bad Girl’ in Prison Break Exonerated. By Inited Press LITTLE ROCK, Ark.. Sept. 28 Acquitted of slaying Helen Spence Eaton, Arkansas "bad girl,” Frank Martin, former trusty guard at the womens state prison farm, went back to prison today to complete his term for murder. Martin shot the girl while trying to recapture her after she escaped from the prison farm.

INDIANAPOLIS, FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1934

\ ggggi /

Federal shelters—new homes for losers

'T'HE outcome of the relief program for transients is an open question. On June 15 of this year, there were in federal shelters 195,000 individuals, not quite 3,000 of whom were women.

25 REGISTERED FOR FIRST AID COURSE Classes to Be Held for Laymen by American Red Cross. A first-aid course for laymen, for which twenty-five registrations already have been accepted, was announced today by the Indianapolis chapter, American Red Cross. Dr. Herbert T. Wagner, city first-aid director for the organization, will supervise the classes. The class will meet first at 7:30 p. m. Tuesday and then at 9 p. m., following Tuesdays. Any one more than 17 years old may enroll with Miss Agnes Cruse, Red Cross executive secretary, 777 North Meridian street. Lewis C. Robbins, first-aid examiner, will be instructor, with Walter Cohn, Theodore Ross and Richard Swan as assistants. 700 POLICEMEN GUARD CHICAGO BUS ROUTES Officers Have Orders to “Shoot to Kill” Following Riot. By United Press CHICAGO, Sept. 28.—Seven hundred policemen patrolled bus routes of the strike beset Chicago Motor Coach Company today with orders to shoot on sight any one interfering with bus movements. At the same time, detective officers said that Alex Semple, held on a charge of shooting to death a bus dispatcher, had named the “union official’ who paid • him $lO for the job. Relatives of Mrs. Mary Kennard, 65-year-old bus passenger who died after being struck by a ball bearing thrown through a coach window, sought to reopen an inquest into her death. The coroner’s jury decided she died of heart disease. Radio Equipment Stolen. Shipping cases containing radio equipment valued at S7O were stolen from the Capitol Paper Company warehouse at 227 West South street yesterday .according to police reports.

SIDE GLANCES By George Clark

“When I wrote them that I thought a family reunion would be Tine, if we held it at one of their homes.this fc tiroe.Jhey just dropped the whole idea..**''

Men and women, I found after I adopted the role of transient unemployed, do not often travel together unless they are man and wife. Once in a while a girl or a woman is found traveling with a group of men or with one man,

THE NATIONAL ROUNDUP 000 mam By Ruth Finney

WASHINGTON, Sept. 28. NRA, disorganized and headless, is face to face with the most serious crisis of its career. Unless a compromise is arranged, a showdown is due Monday on the President’s power, under thf recovery act, to modify NRA codes without the consent of the industry involved. If the dispute is carried into the courts NRA will have to fight for its very life. If it should not be sustained in the right to cancel or

modify any of the agreements it approves, the regulatory powers it was supposed to exercise in lieu of the anti-trust laws would be a dead letter. Another serious strike, involving workers in forty-two states, is threatened also if the Presiednt’s order is not obeyed. The cotton garment industry, not to be confused with the cotton textile industry, is the second party in this dispute. a a a THE President ordered it, six weeks ago, to reduce working hours 10 per cent and to pay as much for the new 36-hour week as it has been paying for 40 hours. The industry, with a former NRA deputy as managing director of its code authority, said several weeks ago it would not obey, and ordered counsel to “take legal steps, if necessary.” There haVe been indications since then that it might agree to compromise or might seek to delay the showdown. Other industries are watching the dispute with close attention. This is the first t/me the President has attempted to use his authority to modify codes and some of them fear, if he is sustained, that other orders will be issued. Last March, the President asked all industries to reduce working hours 10 per cent and raise wages 10 per cent by voluntary action, and most of them did nothing about it. With another winter approaching, and with unemployment higher in August than it was

but that is the exception. I should say that only one out of fifty travels in that fashion. On the highway itself they fraternize. They share food in jungles or along the road. One thing is certain: Most of these people are in government shelters because they have no other place to go. If they had homes or relatives to welcome them, would they have to wait for a social worker to suggest this step to them? And yet that is what the social worker must, under the prpcedure outlined, suggest and carry through. 000 TT ELIEF workers who send individuals back to relatives after waiting days for a grudging consent by special delivery or wire (collect), always wonder what happens when the wanderer reaches that home. Are his exhausted reserves finally broken down by a tense family situation, perhaps originally the cause of his taking to the road? What happens when the receiving end is interested only in avoiding public talk and disgrace. "We wouldn’t want people to know that Fred was on the welfare in another city,” these people tell social workers. What Fred feels about being on charity isn’t so important as what they and the neighbors think about it. Young boys, who compose half the group of male wanderers, are living in a grotesque fairy tale. They emerged into an upsidedown world, after being educated by adventure movies and lurid magazines to the belief that all things are possible to the adventurous spirit. They are not sure what they are seeking, and they don’t think much beyond the present. Why do they keep wandering about? Let a young Negro boy answer: “I gits tired, starvin’ all the time in one place.” NEXT—Wandering Women.

in July, according to figures issued today by the A. F. of L., arbitrary action along these lines is considered a distinct possibility. If some such step is not taken, passage of thirty-hour-week legilation by congress is more probable than at any earlier session. The federation is supporting, this fall, only candidates who promise to vote for their short work week. a a a nnHE cotton garment controversy is almost as old as NRA. This industry, making shirts, overalls and pajamas, has been largely non-union. The dress manufacturing and men's clothing industries, each having contracts with organized labor, signed codes providing for shorter working hours and higher wages. Before long charges were made that exploiting employers were seeking sanctuary unde. - the cotton garment code and were competing unfairly with manufacturers operating according tp the higher standards of the dress and men’s clothing codes. The charges were threshed out at a stormy hearing last June. General Johnson and President Roosevelt thought the matter over for two months and then decided that the cotton garments industry ought to be required to hire more workers and pay larger wages. If a strike is called, it will put to the test new procedure for handling labor troubles just announced by the National Labor Relations Board. PARKING PROVES COSTLY Driver Charged With Operating Lottery Enterprise. While looking in a car which was double parked at Meridian and New York streets late yesterday police are alleged to have found several hundred books of baseball tickets. John F. Beck, 1544 South Talbott avenue, was arrested on charges of double parking, operating a gift scheme and lottery enterprise. TOMATO ‘WAR’ IS BARED 2 Suspects Held in Probe of Attack on Truckmen Freed. Two men held on vagrancy charges for questioning in connection with an alleged tomato war have been discharged. They are Ben F. Marin, 31, and Allen B. Fisk, 30, both of Mt. Summit. Ind. They were held after truckers hauling tomatoes from the south side market reported that they had been fired upon between Franklin and Edinburg. PARKED CARS LOOTED ssl in Liqnor Stolen From One Auto, Police Told. Liquor valued at ssl was stolen last night from- the automobile of R. J. O’Reilly, 4340 Park avenue, parked at Sixteenth street and Capitol avenue, according to police reports. Other thefts from parked cars last night were clothing valued at $37 from A. A. Schwab, Y. M. C. A., and $45 in clothing from Miss Margaret ROSS, Mjpthnriict.

Second Section

Entered a* Second-Oat* Matter at Poatofflce, Indianapolis, Ind.

Fair Enough wnwpn MR. TOM SOPWITH, proprietor and skipper of the British sailboat which didn't win the rac at Newport, expresses himself in roundabout language. but his meaning gets over, nevertheless. “I am bitterly disappointed.” when decoded into familiar terms, becomes the grand old watchword of the prizefight profession, "We was robbed.” The fuss over the sea manners of Mr. Mike Vanderbilt and the ruling of the committee, tossing out Mr. Sopwith's protest because he didn’t hoist his

squawk-flag within the legal time limit, should tend to endear the sport of .yachting to the common man of the United States, who now will begin to realize that the sport of sailing boats has much in common with pugilism and the baseball industry. Up to now it had been regarded as a rather superior and therefore insufferable kind of play. That was due to the fact that thirty-nine years had elapsed since the squawk-signal had been flung to the breeze in a race for the America’s cup. Any sport in which the contestants invest a million dollars on each side

and then care so little about winning as to go thirty-nine years without hollering "we was robbed” is likely to impress the mass of sportsmen, accustomed to the brisk recriminations of the ring and ball yard, as something too insipid for their interest. But it will have to be acknowledged that when they did shed their refinement and get down to squawking, the yachtsmen more than caught up on their arrears of squawkage. Mr. Sopwith complained of something which Mr. Vanderbilt had done and the committee disallowed his moan on the ground that one good squawk deserves another. He waited until the heat was run and did not break out his beef-pennant until the sailboats were on their way back to the buoys. The committee, very properly, applied a rule of competition which holds that a contestant desiring to emit the nautical equivalent of the pugilistic “ow, keep them punches up,” must do so right away. 000 Accusing Each Other on Sight THERE is a very good legal theory behind this rule, the idea being that the defendant deserves his chance to enter a counter-squawk, relating to the same incident. In the learned and honorable profession of the law, distinguished members of which had a hand in the w’riting of the rules for the sailboat race, this is routine procedure. Consequently, persons w’ho sue the Ward Line for injuries suffered in the Morro Castle disaster may themselves be sued for playing with matches or failing to turn in their life belts on reaching the beach. The* committee therefore advised Mr. Sopwith that to entertain his belated squawk would be to violate a fundamental principle of squawkery. Consequently, when they sailed again both sportsmen w r ere seen to be flying the squawk-flag from the start of the race. Taking no chances this time, they accused one another on sight and the great international sail boat race closed out fittingly with both sides sore, according to the highest traditions of international sport. After thirty-nine years, it was a grand revival in yachting of the same sporting spirit which impelled the French to mob the American rugby football team in the Olympics of 1924 and an American sportsman to accuse the Japanese swimmers of inhaling oxygen when the Japanese won in 1932, 000 A Bad Name, But Not Deservedly r |''HE monotonous chivalry and amity which had characterized the America’s cup races for all those years gave sailboat racing a bad name with the citizens which was not entirely deserved. They had had their little fouls and squawks in yachting right along. In one interesting case within the last few years a sailboat on Long Island sound, failing to show as much foot as the wind and her spread of lingerie deserved, was discovered to be dragging a sort of kite-tail of tin cans and old buckets. This was as good a foul as anything that Jack Sharkey performed in all his distinguished career, but for some reason it never was exploited properly and the sport of sailboat racing was denied a degree of earned prestige with the citizens. On the social side of things, the champion loser at the little sports and pastimes in the gambling casino this time was not any Wall Street financier, but a sports writer who ran up a deficit of $3,000 and left the management a piece of paper to remember him by. Journalism is coming on. It Is to be hoped, for the good name of the profession, that the journalist in question will take up his paper in good time. But even if he should only pick up 10 per cent of it, that still would be no reason for financiers of the Newport set to look askance at journalism. The Newport financiers laid much paper themselves, in the way of bonds and stocks, in the era of beautiful nonsense whose holders would be lucky to cash in at 10 per cent. (Coeyriaht, If. 4. by United Feature Syndicate. Inc.)

Your Health BY DR. MORRIS FISH&EIN

ALTHOUGH society has grown quite a bit more lenient in its attitude toward victims of venereal diseases, there still is some hesitation on the part of such victims to apply for immediate and authentic medical aid. Asa result, serious consequences may come from cases that could be cured if treated quickly. In the case of locomotor ataxia, particularly, treatment to be beneficial must be immediate. If a person with this condition delays seeing a reputable physician for any length of time, the change in the tissues of the nervous system is so great that not much can be done. However, under any circumstances, active and intensive treatment may be helpful. Although only from 2 to 5 per cent of person* who have syphilis, the most serious venereal disorder, eventually develop locomotor ataxia, it is now well established that every case of locomotor ataxia develops from syphilis. nun THERE is some evidence to indicate that a special form of spirochete—the organism which causes syphilis—is responsible for locomotor ataxia. It is believed to reside in the nervous system. The condition usually develops from five to twenty years after the original syphilitic infection, but, of course, it may appear at almost any period after infection. Majority of cases of locomotor ataxia occur in men past 40 years of age. although cases do occur in women and even in children. Symptoms of locomotor ataxia by which the doctor makes his diagnosis are rather definite. In the first place the reflexes, like the knee Jerk, begin to disappear. 9 9 9 REASON for disappearance of these reflexes is the fact that the disease blocks the path in the spinal cord along which stimulation for the action ordinarily travels. There are changes in the reactions of the eyes and also in stability of the body. Severe pains which develop in locomotor ataxia are sharp, stabbing, shooting ones, occurring most commonly in legs and arms. These dart from place to place and last for one or two seconds. They are so characteristic that they are called lightning pains. Sometimes theie pains occur in the internal organs. When the internal organs are affected, the disorders are called crises. In such conditions there is paroxysmal pa n in the abdomen, with pallor, sweating, sometimes vomiting, and a good deal of distress. The change in the eye reactions is rather significant. The pupil of the eye will react to the vision of objects at a distance or close up, but will not react to changes In bright light. -v *

£$

Westbrook Pegler