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| author | www-data <www-data@mail.pglaf.org> | 2026-06-07 14:09:47 -0700 |
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| committer | www-data <www-data@mail.pglaf.org> | 2026-06-07 14:09:47 -0700 |
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diff --git a/78827-h/78827-h.htm b/78827-h/78827-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f8eae7d --- /dev/null +++ b/78827-h/78827-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3588 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <title> + Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang, Vol. III. No. 32, April, 1922 | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> +<style> + +a { + text-decoration: none; +} + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + +h1,h2,h3 { + text-align: center; + clear: both; +} + +hr { + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + clear: both; + width: 65%; + margin-left: 17.5%; + margin-right: 17.5%; +} + +ul { + list-style-type: none; +} + +li { + margin-top: .5em; + padding-left: 2em; + text-indent: -2em; +} + +.starbreak { + text-align: center; + clear: both; + margin: 1em auto; + letter-spacing: 2em; +} + +table { + margin: 1em auto 1em auto; + max-width: 40em; + border-collapse: collapse; +} + +p { + margin-top: 0.5em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: 0.5em; + text-indent: 1em; +} + +p.dropcap { + text-indent: 0em; +} + +p.dropcap:first-letter { + float: left; + margin: 0.1em 0.1em 0em 0em; + font-size: 450%; +} + +.bbox { + page-break-before: always; + border: double; + padding: 0.5em; + margin: auto auto 1.5em auto; +} + +.blockquote { + margin: 1.5em 10%; +} + +.bold { + font-weight: bold; +} + +.box { + border: 2px solid black; + padding: 0.5em; +} + +.bb { + border-bottom: double; +} + +.bt-bb { + border-top: double; + border-bottom: double; +} + +.by { + font-weight: bold; + font-size: 130%; + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + margin-bottom: 0.75em; +} + +.caption { + text-align: center; + margin-bottom: 1em; + font-size: 90%; + text-indent: 0em; +} + +.center { + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; +} + +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; +} + +.form { + width: 100%; + border-bottom: 1px dotted; +} + +.hanging { + padding-left: 2em; + text-indent: -2em; +} + +.larger { + font-size: 150%; +} + +.noindent { + text-indent: 0em; +} + +.pagenum { + position: absolute; + right: 4%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + font-style: normal; +} + +.poetry-container { + text-align: center; + margin: 1em; +} + +.poetry { + display: inline-block; + text-align: left; +} + +.poetry .stanza { + margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em; +} + +.poetry .verse { + text-indent: -3em; + padding-left: 3em; +} + +/* Poetry indents */ +.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3.0em;} +.poetry .indent2 {text-indent: -2.0em;} +.poetry .indent4 {text-indent: -1.0em;} +.poetry .indent12 {text-indent: 3.0em;} +.poetry .indent24 {text-indent: 9.0em;} +.poetry .indent38 {text-indent: 16.0em;} + +.right { + text-align: right; +} + +.sans { + font-family: sans-serif; + font-weight: bold; + font-size: 90%; +} + +.smaller { + font-size: 80%; +} + +.smcap { + font-variant: small-caps; + font-style: normal; +} + +.spacer { + padding-left: 5em; +} + +.u { + border-bottom: 3px solid; +} + +.w20 { + max-width: 20em; + margin: auto; +} + +.w40 { + max-width: 40em; + margin: auto; +} + +.red { + border: double #dd3729; + page-break-before: always; + padding: 0.5em; + margin: auto auto 1.5em auto; +} + +.all-red { + color: #dd3729; +} + +.x-ebookmaker img { + max-width: 100%; + width: auto; + height: auto; +} + +.x-ebookmaker .poetry { + display: block; + margin-left: 1.5em; +} + +.x-ebookmaker .blockquote { + margin: 1.5em 5%; +} + +.x-ebookmaker p.dropcap:first-letter { + float: none; + margin: 0; + font-size: 100%; +} + </style> + </head> + +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78827 ***</div> + +<main> + +<h1>Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang, Vol. III. No. 32, April, 1922</h1> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 430px;"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" width="430" height="600" alt="Cover image"> +</div> + +<hr> + +<div class="w40 bb all-red"> + +<div class="bt-bb"> + +<h2>The Winter Annual</h2> + +</div> + +<p class="center">(See inside back cover)</p> + +<p class="center larger"><i>CONTENTS</i></p> + +<ul> +<li><span class="smcap">Drippings from the Fawcett</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Girl in Blue Velvet Band</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Face on the Barroom Floor</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Frankie and Johnnie Blues</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Shooting of Dan McGrew</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Wedding of the Persian Cat</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Ace in the Hole</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Booze Fighter’s Dream</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Diary of a Divorcee</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Fable of the Bull</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Highty Tighty Aphrodite</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Golightly Highballs</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">How to Kiss Deliciously</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Hunting the Wily Pole Cat</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Mohammedan Bull</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Our Own Fairy Queen</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Tool House on the Farm</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">The Old Smokehouse</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Questions and Answers</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Gila Monster Route</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Pasture Pot Pourri</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Hooch Cure Blues</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Dying Hobo</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Lasca</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Sam’s Girl</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Toledo Slim</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Evolution</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Poppies</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">After the Raid</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">The Harpy</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">The Suicide</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Tarnished Goods</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Separation</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Little Red God</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">The Ladies</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Limber Kicks</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Naughty But Nice</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">To the Girl</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Rural Mail Box</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Tired Hired Man</span></li> +<li><span class="smcap">Life’s a Funny Proposition After All</span></li> +</ul> + +</div> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">[1]</span></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 400px;"> +<img src="images/titlepage.jpg" width="400" height="600" alt="Title page image"> + +<p class="caption"><i>Captain Billy’s<br> +Whiz Bang</i></p> + +<p class="caption"><i>America’s Magazine of<br> +Wit, Humor and<br> +Filosophy</i></p> + +<p class="caption">APRIL, 1922 <span class="spacer">Vol. III. No. 32</span></p> + +<p class="caption">Published Monthly<br> +W. H. Fawcett,<br> +at Robbinsdale, Minnesota</p> + +<p class="caption">Entered as second-class matter May 1, 1920, at the postoffice at +Robbinsdale, Minnesota, under the +Act of March 3, 1879.</p> + +<p class="caption">Price 25 cents <span class="spacer">$2.50 per year</span><br> +ONE DOLLAR FOR THE WINTER ANNUAL</p> + +<p class="caption">Contents of this magazine are copyrighted. Republication of any part +permitted when properly credited to Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang.</p> + +</div> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">[2]</span></p> + +<p class="center">“We have room for but one soul loyalty and that is loyalty to +the American people.”—Theodore Roosevelt.</p> + +<p class="center">Copyright 1922<br> +By W. H. Fawcett</p> + +<div class="box"> + +<p class="center">Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang employs no solicitors. +Subscriptions may be received only at authorized news +stands or by direct mail to Robbinsdale. We join in no +clubbing offers, nor do we give premiums. Two-fifty a +year in advance.</p> + +</div> + +<p class="center">Edited by a Spanish and World War Veteran and dedicated to the +fighting forces of the United States</p> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">[3]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2><i>Drippings From the Fawcett</i></h2> + +</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Readers of this little bundle of farm-yard +foolishness and filosophy may have +gotten a kick out of some of our jabs at +the movie colony that hangs out at Hollywood—on +the Pacific Coast near Los Anglaise.</p> + +<p>There are estimated to be about 30,000 people +engaged in the motion picture industry in +Hollywood and environs. Out of this crew there +are a lot of lame-brains, a goodly sprinkling of +nincompoops, who flaunt their peccadillos with +a too-apparent wish to have them noticed and +press-agented. They wear brass-band clothes, +ride around in noisy cars with license tags like +“Fatty” Arbuckle’s “606,” and live noisy lives.</p> + +<p>By the very nature of their employment they +are in the public eye and everything they do +comes under the public’s microscope. Every +move they make is published to the eager world +by their zealous press agents. A home-brew +party in a bungalow comes forth a “Neroesque +orgy in a mansion,” as Waldemar Young put +it. And yet, goodness knows, they probably +have enough of the real kind—and we envy +them.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">[4]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">However, what are we coming to, is +that the noisy movie people have their +prototypes everywhere in society and its +numerous substrata, and we for one are not +going to make any scavenger’s holiday out of +the William Desmond Taylor murder mess in +Los Angeles.</p> + +<p>Taylor appears to have been an artist of +high calibre—hard-working, earnest, capable +and a gentleman. But he permitted himself to +be murdered—and he was a movie director. +Consequently the public immediately put Taylor +on trial. They dragged his name through +the mud, swishing, swashing. Having put Taylor +on trial, it was found that he had taken a +stage name—a common thing in the movie and +the fight game. But when a man gets murdered +he ought to be more careful.</p> + +<p>Man of mystery, “Dual life.” Perhaps yes +and perhaps no.</p> + +<p>But a lot of buncombe, any way you look +at is—Imbecilic, puerile. That’s what we think +of the campaign of calumny against the motion +picture colony growing out of the Taylor murder.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">The other day we read a statement from +Frank Mayo, a movie actor, who burst +out with this denunciation: “The Hollywood +film colony is a pernicious influence. +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">[5]</span>Scatter it, abolish it, burn it up—I say.” Mayo +ought to be ashamed of himself. We might +just as sensibly orate Robbinsdale—burn it up, +scatter red pepper in every front yard and +squirt formaldehyde through every key-hole. +Somebody tried to rob the Robbinsdale bank +and got killed at it.</p> + +<p>As we have hereinbefore set forth, there are +a lot of tramps in Hollywood—just as there are +a lot of undesirables in Robbinsdale, in Minneapolis, +in Chicago. And there are just as many +honest, decent men and women in the picture +business as in the ranks of the sanctimonious +reformers, even if they do not go around mouthing +the scavenger’s chant “I am holier than +thou.”</p> + +<p>If Mayo had said: “Run out the undesirables,” +we might have joined with him in a +hearty “amen.” But it is childish and surely +unfair to damn the good with the bad.</p> + +<p>The mayor of Los Angeles insists that the +actresses and actors of Hollywood are fine citizens, +good neighbors and respectable ladies +and gentlemen. Adolph Zukor, who is head of +the Famous Players, declares: “There is no +more immorality in Hollywood than in the New +York Stock Exchange”—not much of a boost for +Hollywood but a powerful statement just the +same.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">[6]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Finally, you find Hobart Bosworth +throwing the responsibility squarely in +the faces of an audience that listened to +him: “You think that we of the motion picture +world are rotten. Through the confessions of +the box office we know that you, the public, are +rotten.”</p> + +<p>Mayo’s statement is not true. The man who +agrees with him has forgotten that things exist +because certain definite forces have brought +them into being—and Hollywood, even though +rotten to the core, burnt up or scattered would +arise again somewhere else. The mayor of Los +Angeles spoke half the truth, at least. The +motion picture people are folk like all the rest. +Bosworth is blind. He is angry when he should +be sympathetic, despising when he should be +greatly moved by the pathos of the spectacle.</p> + +<p>If there is weakness in the movie picture +colonies the imperfections are not the result of +viciousness and immorality in the public that +Bosworth calls “rotten.” It is the effect of +loneliness and frustrated hopes that sends the +starved ones to the movies. It is no small thing +in each human being—that longing for beauty +and the allurements of wealth, love and +triumph. But the sum of all this longing combined +and packed into the streams that flow +toward Hollywood is stupendously powerful.</p> + +<p>It makes life what it is in the motion pictures, +brings out the noise in those who have +not had proper advantages and makes puppets +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">[7]</span>of men and women who ought to be just “plain +folk” and ruins their lives.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">But so far as William Desmond Taylor is +concerned—We are unable to see that the +movies made a puppet out of him. He was +in life respected by his associates—a leader, a +man of ideals. And that is why the little old +Whiz Banger refuses to be stampeded with the +gang that is burrowing in the Hollywood garbage +can, seeking delicacies of juicy, ripe dirt +to twist their long tongues around.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">We’ve heard the story of the lions and the +lionesses, tigers and tigresses, and bears +and bear cubs, but not until we became +a guest on board the U. S. S. Niagara in Havana +harbor of Lieutenants Parsons and Faga did +we really discover the superintelligence of wild +animals. The first member of the crew we met +was a jovial gob, Jack Sellers, who introduced +us to his Pride and Joy, the mascot, a big black +bear.</p> + +<p>“This bear is very intelligent,” vouchsafed +Sellers. “You know we sailors sleep in hammocks +on the decks. In the middle of the night +when the bear gets cold he sneaks around and +steals blankets off the sleeping gobs. He carries +the blankets to a secluded spot on the ship +and piles them evenly, one on top of the other, +until he gets forty or fifty. He then retires for +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">[8]</span>a comfortable nap on his downy bed. When the +gobs are awakened from the chill and find their +blankets missing they immediately search for +Bruin. Would you believe it, that bear won’t +let any jackie take his bedding until he first +smells him and then sniffs at the pile of blankets? +When he finds the rightful owner he +pulls out his blanket from the pile and gives it +to him.”</p> + +<p>Woof! Woof! Woof!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>A New York poet who knows the yearnings of a demi-virgin’s +heart gave this verse the title “Naughty—But Nice,” +a plagiarized version of an original poem under that title +which was published in an early issue of the Whiz Bang +and the Whiz Bang Winter Annual. The New York Times, +in publishing this verse, believes a more fitting title would be</i>:</p> + +<h3>It Can’t Be Done</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>I want to be naughty, but I want to be nice,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>I don’t mind the route, but I don’t like the price.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>I want to do what the other girls do—</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Tease ’em, and cuddle up, and bill and coo.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Blacken my eyes, and powder my nose;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Roll my cigarettes and my hose;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Rouge my cheek and pencil my lip;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Carry a silver flask on my hip;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Tango a little, and shimmy a lot;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Park my corset when the weather gets hot.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Ride and swim and golf and skate;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Take the fences instead of the gate.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Break all records—yes, all but one—</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>And be good and true when the game is done.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>I don’t like pepper, but I do love spice;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>I want to be naughty, but I want to be nice.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">[9]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">“Dear Billy,” writes Chris Corey, a +Minneapolis pill pusher, “You are always +writing jokes about other tradesmen +but nothing about we druggists. Now, +you know we all handle the Whiz Bang and are +great boosters for it, so please give us a joke +about the pill pounders.”</p> + +<p>All right, Chris, here’s one, having to do +with your recent convention of druggists in +Minneapolis—The chairman rapped with his +gavel, “You are out of order, sir!”</p> + +<p>“I beg your pardon, Mr. Chairman,” responded +the speaker, “I never felt better in my +life.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>They have a new way of catching whitefish +at Breezy Point in the winter months. The fisherman +repairs to the frozen over river with a +hammer, a saw and a can of peas. He cuts +a hole in the ice, sprinkles the peas around the +edge of the hole and when the fish comes up to +take a bite he hits him over the head with the +hammer.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Americans in Cuba for the most part are +strictly business. I hadn’t been in Havana +twenty-four hours until fellow citizens +tried to sell me the Malecon; Morro Castle; the +Almendares; a boneless elephant; some finless +fish; fiddlers’ soup; and a throatless frog. I’ll +tell you our brother Americans in Cuba are +great for business.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">[10]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>“Humor”</h3> + +<p>The following is a vivacious little conceit, +entitled “Humor,” culled from Laura Benet’s +“Fairy Bread.” (Thomas Seltzer.)</p> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>A fairy dances</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>In upland pastures,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Picking tart crabapples,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Swinging low;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Twisted and green,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Elfin-mouth, lean,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>His feet may be chained</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>They are never slow.</i></div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>He slyly peeps under</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Bushes of wonder,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Hunts for thistles</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>In hedgerow trees</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>And straight thereafter</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Tickles to laughter</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Solemn asses</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>On bended knees.</i></div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Where his sharp wits go</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Occasions grow,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>The blind see meadows</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Of waving corn;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Men mazed with talking</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Find lost hopes walking</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>When he conjures roses</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Out of a thorn.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Turn ’im Loose, Judge!</h3> + +<p>Judge—Are you guilty or not guilty?</p> + +<p>Prisoner—I was going to plead guilty, yer +honor, but my lawyer has convinced me that I +am innocent.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">[11]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Boys in the Back Room</h3> + +<p>“Vat will you haf?”</p> + +<p>“Vat haf you got?”</p> + +<p>“Ve haf some nice ha’f and ha’f.”</p> + +<p>“You haf? Ha’f vat and ha’f vat?”</p> + +<p>“Ha’f ha’f of vun per cent dark and ha’f ha’f +of vun per cent light.”</p> + +<p>“Vell, I think I’ll haf to haf a seegar.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller bold">“Maud kicked the bucket,” said Gus, as he sadly surveyed +the spilt milk.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Sob Stuff</h3> + +<div class="smaller"> + +<p><b>Dear Capt. Billy Fairfax</b>—I’m on a visit from the +East. Fell in love with a Western girl. For the past six +months I have been faithful to her, I thought my love +was returned and never looked at anyone else. Took her +around the country some and to different places of amusement. +Finally on a beautiful moonlight night I took her +in my arms. Oh, my, I can see her now—her beautiful +face, Oh, those eyes, those nose, those mouth, those +beautiful hair.</p> + +<p>I kissed her and she closed her beautiful eyes. She +was happy I thought. Things went on fine but as I had +not been in the town long I didn’t know much of what +had been going on. Then to my sorrow I found there +was someone else, a guy with a super-six and a tin ear. +I was broken-hearted, she had lied, used me for a fool. +Then this shy, modest thing I had trusted crushed me by +telling others she had never cared for me and also laughingly +told them of my lovesick talk. What do you think +of that for honor and decency? She continues to talk +and my life is a miserable affair.</p> + +<p>Please advise me what to do, because if my wife ever +hears what this girl has to say she’ll “raise ’ell.”—<b>Pete +Olson.</b></p> + +</div> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">[12]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Iowa Frivol Pulls This One</h3> + +<p>An optimist is a man going up the river with +a canoe, a girl, a basket, a blanket and a couple +of pillows.</p> + +<p>A pessimist is the same man coming back.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>She was so bow-legged she could wear a pair +of parenthesis for stockings!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Height of Ambition</h3> + +<p>I sure got a fine job since I came out of the +Army.</p> + +<p>What’s that.</p> + +<p>Well, you know the fellow that hammers underneath +the passenger cars, well, I help him +listen.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Ancient Stuff</h3> + +<p>El—“What did you give the baby when it +was christened?”</p> + +<p>Ella—“A silver spoon.”</p> + +<p>El—“Was it a good one?”</p> + +<p>Ella—“I’ll say it was. It had ‘Blackstone +Hotel’ on it.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Ikenstein—“Your new stenographer iss a +beaut. Can she spell?”</p> + +<p>Rubenstein—“Vat hass that to do vid it?”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Speaking of stingy people, I knew a fellow +that had two teeth extracted and then wanted +the price of his board reduced.</p> + + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">[13]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2><i>Hollywood Flirtations</i></h2> + +</div> + +<p class="smaller">(<i>The following item was written a few days before the +tragic death of Mr. Taylor. Miss Normand at this time is +reported the last known visitor to Mr. Taylor’s apartment +before the slaying.</i>)</p> + +<p class="dropcap">Mabel Normand is tripping the light +fantastic at the Cocoanut Grove very +often. Sometimes it’s William D. Taylor, +Lasky director, and we also hear that Mack +Sennett gave her a wonderful birthday party +and many presents. When the girls get Mabel +to talk in the seclusion of her own boudoir, the +sly gal brings out a little bag just dangling full +of nice diamond solitaire engagement rings. +When she gets a new one she gives the bag a +toss and giggles! That’s how seriously Mabel +takes this matrimony stuff!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">An ironic fact has put May Collins into the +very dressing room at the Mayer studio +formerly occupied by Mildred Harris. +May, you know, has been often reported as engaged +to Charlie Chaplin, Mildred’s noted ex. +Miss Collins, it is said, found a picture of +Charlie in a remote drawer of the dresser, +wiped off the dust and stuck it in the mirror +for her own perusal!</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">[14]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Bebe Daniels’ grandmother, her mother +and Jack Dempsey all deny that Bebe and +Jack are to wed. Reporters have even interviewed +the family cat on the subject, but the +news tip has fallen flat all around!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">And, speaking of Charlie Chaplin, his +leading lady, Edna Purviance (who was +one of Charlie’s early loves as well) is +reported engaged to Paul Hunter, wealthy +business man and polo player of Pasadena.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Lucille Carlisle again will be leading +lady for Larry Semon. She formerly +was engaged to marry Semon, but suddenly +the engagement was declared off; she +left the studio and nothing had been heard of +her for several months. Now it appears that +all is again sweetness and light between Miss +Carlisle and the comedian.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Whiz Bang will soon invade a new territory. +We believe that the Laguna +Beach and La Jolla artist colonies have +been too long neglected in our zeal to disclose +those little personal affairs out in Hollywood. +While fair and winsome Hollywood nobly tows +a few barges of stuff, Whiz Bang’s astute investigators +have discovered naughty Laguna +Beach doing just terrible things and getting +away with it because there are four hours of +muddy automobile road away from any sort of +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">[15]</span>town. La Jolla has this week confirmed some +of our suspicions in the bathing suit marriage +which took place when Del Carmen and Sarah +Andrews plighted their serious (?) troth in the +trough of the ocean. Artist like, they just +wanted to be “different.”</p> + +<p>Of course you wouldn’t think an artist who +paints with a brush could be as lowbrow as +those Hollywood actors, but you just ought to +be in on some of the parties staged down at +sneaky little Laguna Beach. An artist colony +(many of them people of national reputation, +too), resides there permanently in a little world +of their own. Judging from several little Bohemian +affairs visited by Whiz Bang’s official +chaperone, we would judge that everyone’s in +love with best friend’s wife, and best friend +doesn’t even care! Sandals, and loose sloppy +clothes and no haircuts usually travel with +freedom of thought. That’s why it’s hard to +believe that some of Hollywood’s most athletic, +healthiest, best groomed and best clothed actors +are steeped in sin!</p> + +<p>The Hollywood Chamber of Commerce and +the Motion Picture Producers’ Association have +just joined forces to combat magazine and +newspaper propaganda tending to paint Hollywood +as a modern Babylon. Whiz Bang suggests +the simple expedient of throwing loads +of mud at somebody else (perhaps Laguna or +La Jolla), thus diverting the scandal hungry +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">[16]</span>eyes of the nation away from Hollywood long +enough to pull a few more good parties.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Charlie Chaplin and Douglas Gerrard +gave a lovely dinner party in honor +of Mme. Anna Pavlowa, husband and +company on their recent visit to Los Angeles. +This year’s party was drier than the last, but +Douglas, we haven’t forgotten that party you +gave in Anna’s honor about two years ago! The +Wilshire district and Los Angeles “upper ten” +gave a smart tea in the afternoon at the residence +of a well-known society woman. Everyone +in society was there and poor Anna shook +hands and said polite things until her patience +was almost at an end. So, when Douglas’ party +was pulled off that evening ’tis said Anna cut +loose, enjoyed a lot of naughty stories and +vowed she preferred Bohemians! You know +Douglas can tell ’em, too!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">It was only two weeks ago that we thought +we saw Mabel Normand dancing at the +Cocoanut Grove with F. Richard Jones; +chief director under Mack Sennett, but Mabel +“bawled” out a morning sheet for insinuating +such a thing, so maybe it isn’t true! Anyhow, +Mrs. F. Richard has just filed suit for divorce. +She asks $1,000 a month alimony, claiming +hubby earns $100,000 a year. Mutual jealousy +seems to have caused the break-up.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">[17]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">“Billie” Rhodes, comedy star of picturedom, +has filed a divorce action +against William Jobelmann, a theater +publicity man. She charges he drank, even +stealing a bottle from her own private stock +to appease his desire. This, says Billie, capped +the climax and she asks her freedom.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Mrs. Thelma Morgan Goetz, pretty +English actress, has just divorced +Ronald Goetz, formerly a captain in the +English army. They are both members of Hollywood’s +film colony. “He made a wonderful +lover,” complained the wife, “but not a good +husband. He wanted his fling—he craved variety.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Paramount opened its Wilshire district +studio just recently. Was it for this reason +that the Los Angeles police department +found it necessary to open a Wilshire station +the same day?</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="bold"><i>When a woman puckers up her lips to be +kissed she is just setting her trap.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Man is somewhat like a sausage,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Very smooth upon the skin,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But you never can tell exactly</div> + <div class="verse indent0">How much hog there is within.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>“Youth must have its fling,” said the Scotchman, as he +started his bag-pipe working.</i></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">[18]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Torch’s Best One</h3> + +<p>She (to fair friend)—“I’m not going with +Bill any more.”</p> + +<p>Fair Friend—“Why not?”</p> + +<p>She—“He knows too many naughty songs.”</p> + +<p>Fair Friend—“Does he sing them?”</p> + +<p>She—“No, but he’s always whistling them.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Song of the Tire Chain</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Wee, wee, wee,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Klop, klop, klop,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Squeak, squawk, squeak,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Twat, twat, twat.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Girls may smoke. However, the correct way +to light a match still remains a man’s privilege.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>In Valparaiso</h3> + +<p>Why so sad, Diogenes?</p> + +<p>I was going up College Avenue looking for +an honest man, and, alas, someone stole my +lantern.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“That pianist sure claws a mean batch of +ivories.”</p> + +<p>“Yeh, he sure beats a nasty can!”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Now do be sure to come and see us soon, +won’t you?”</p> + +<p>“Yes, we will. We’ll call on you the first +time we go slumming.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">[19]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Soliloquy of a Hooch-hound</h3> + +<p>When my soul becomes clogged with evil +deeds, my mind and conscience inundated with +hideous hallucinations, and my heart dry and +acrid with the pain of living, I imbue my soul, +my heart, my mind with King Alcohol.</p> + +<p>Then, as the morning breeze dissipates the +fog, the kindly King cleanses my soul; as the +sun dries and purifies the stagnant swamp, so +Alcohol transforms the morass of my mind into +a verdant meadow; as the spring rains change +the desolation of winter into flowers and grain, +so my lord and master changes the cynical, +skeptical desert of my heart into an oasis of +compassion and philanthropy.</p> + +<p>That’s why I drink.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Diff’unce</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller sans"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Percival chews Spearmint,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">John, Virginia twist;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Percy shakes a wicked hoof,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And John, a wicked fist.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Special For the Clergy</h3> + +<p>“Father,” explained the visitor to the priest, +“I ask penance for the sin of bootlegging.”</p> + +<p>Father Kelly was puzzled and telephoned +the superior father for advice.</p> + +<p>“What shall I give a bootlegger, Very Reverend +Sir?” the priest inquired.</p> + +<p>“Don’t give him more than five dollars,” +came the answer. “That’s all I ever pay.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">[20]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>London Post Toastie</h3> + +<p>“Oh, what a naughty little boy,” cried the +kind lady, “to beat and kick his poor mother +like that!”</p> + +<p>“Take no notice of the choild at all,” responded +the proud mother. “Bliss his little +heart, he must do everything he sees his father +do!”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller bold"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Bones to Bones,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And skin to skin;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Ain’t it heck</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When a feller’s thin?</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Lodge Notice</h3> + +<p>The Bootleggers’ Benevolent Association of +America.</p> + +<p>Meets every Thirsty night at Wood-Alco +Hall. At our next meeting the following officers +will be installed:</p> + +<p>F. U. Selloyl, High Muck-a-Muck of the +Mash.</p> + +<p>I. Rob. Sellers, Bearer of the Boot.</p> + +<p>Formal D. Hyde, Lord of the Leg.</p> + +<p>R. Ott Gutt, Licker of the Labels and Seals.</p> + +<p>A special lecture on “Making Moonshine +with the Materials at Hand” will be given, +with Prof. Ray Sinn at the Still.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Spring Sports</h3> + +<p>Standing in the barnyard and watching the +cows come in.</p> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">[21]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2>Questions and Answers</h2> + +</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Captain Billy</i></b>—I am a young man, fifteen +years old, and I am going with two girls, +one fourteen and the other twenty-seven. Do +you think it possible to love both of them at the +same time?—<b><i>Willie Bohy.</i></b></p> + +<p>No, Willie, not if they know it.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Cap’n Bill</i></b>—When the silverware for +your meal consists of more than three pieces, +which side do you start on, the right or left?—<b><i>Konnick +Essen.</i></b></p> + +<p>Start at either side, Konnick, but be sure +and have one piece left for the dessert.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Bill</i></b>—Of late I have been having +trouble with my lungs and thought perhaps you +could suggest a remedy.—<b><i>Ada Clock.</i></b></p> + +<p>Dear Ada—Merely open a window and throw +out your chest.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—Please give us the definition +of Booster, also Knocker.—<b><i>Isin Yet Tu.</i></b></p> + +<p>A Booster is a man with something to sell, +and a Knocker is one who bought some of it.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">[22]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—What is the difference +between a dawnce and a dance?—<b><i>Iowa Bill.</i></b></p> + +<p>The difference between a dawnce and a dance +is one dollar and fifty cents and three fights.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—What is a goblet?—<b><i>Frank +Furter.</i></b></p> + +<p>A small sailor.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Bill</i></b>—My little boy has worms; +what would you suggest?—<b><i>Alvie.</i></b></p> + +<p>Feed him fish, fish like worms.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—Percy, my sixteen-year-old +son, says his greatest ambition is to sing +tenor in a glee club. What shall I do?—<b><i>Worried +Mama.</i></b></p> + +<p>The case is hopeless. You never should have +named him Percy.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Doctor Bill</i></b>—One night at a party I +met a fellow and he had to escort me home. +When we got to a dark place he pushed me into +a mud puddle and ran. Do you think he loves +me?—<b><i>Sis Hopkins.</i></b></p> + +<p>There can be no question of it.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Captain Whiz Bang</i></b>—I very much enjoy +hunting, but also believe in the protection +of wild animal life. What shall I do?—<b><i>Daniel +Boone of Kokomo.</i></b></p> + +<p>Always use blank cartridges.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">[23]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—Since I enrolled at the +University, I have heard the girls talking about +dates. Tell me what a date is and how to acquire +them.—<b><i>Iowa Girl.</i></b></p> + +<p>Dates grow in Palestine, Arabia, and other +Oriental countries. They also flourish on the +walls of telephone booths and in pool halls. +Send me your picture and you will hear from +me soon or I will return the picture.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—Can you recommend a +stiff drink?—<b><i>Bill Eltinge.</i></b></p> + +<p>Embalming fluid.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—What is your idea of an +ideal job?—<b><i>Abie Friedman.</i></b></p> + +<p>Pork inspector for the City of Jerusalem.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—What fish does a girl like +most?—<b><i>A. John.</i></b></p> + +<p>Her ring.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Dear Capt. Billy</i></b>—Do you believe in reincarnation?—<b><i>Havana +Eggie.</i></b></p> + +<p>Can’t say as I do. However, should I ever +be reincarnated my hopes are to be either a +colored man or a Hebrew. A colored man, you +know, doesn’t want anything much and a Hebrew +usually has all he wants.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="bold">They called the baby Fish-hooks—it was such a +“catchy” name.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">[24]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Ace of Tragedies</h3> + +<p>“It was in the spring of 1896,” related the +grizzled veteran of the Yarn-Stretcher’s Club, +according to the London Post, “that I was out +in the Wild West. I was on a jury that was +trying a man for homicide. I hated to think of +the fellow being hanged, so I stuck out against +the other eleven jurymen for five solid days +and nights. My obstinacy was rewarded. One +by one they gave in, and we returned into +Court and returned a verdict of ‘Not Guilty.’ +The only thing that spoiled my satisfaction +with the result was that some of the citizens +had lynched the prisoner the first day we were +locked up.”</p> + +<p>And he sighed, reminiscently, as he took +another gulp of his whisky-and-soda.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Toole’s Best One</h3> + +<p>Small boy (handing grocer two cents)—“I +want two cents’ worth of bananas.”</p> + +<p>“We have no bananas,” said the grocer, not +wanting to monkey with two cents.</p> + +<p>“What’s them?” said the boy, pointing to a +bunch of bananas.</p> + +<p>“Pineapples,” the grocer replied.</p> + +<p>“Well, gimme two cents’ worth of pineapples.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Southern Hospitality</h3> + +<p class="bold"><i>Does you all like yore entatanment wit or +witout?</i></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">[25]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Walking with a Purpose</h3> + +<p>I love to walk.</p> + +<p>Last Sunday I took the most wonderful +stroll.</p> + +<p>I went for quite some distance through the +park, thoroughly enjoying every breath of the +cool, crisp air. I felt like a new man as I hastened +onward, increasing my speed at every +step. I walked on and on, drinking in the +beauty of all about me. It was wonderful.</p> + +<p>Finally I picked her up.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Coffin Nail Epitaph</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Here lies my good friend</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Willie Betts;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>His age was ten—</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Cigarettes.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Our Monthly Proverb</h3> + +<p>A stitch in time gathers no moss.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">In the vernacular of the Bowery,</p> + +<p class="smaller">“DE OILY BOID CATCHES DE WOIM.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>A Warning to Flappers</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller bold"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, all good girlies go to Heaven,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">8, 9, 10, e-leven, 12, all bad girlies don’t.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Our Latest Song Hit</h3> + +<p>“A Cat Has Nine Lives, But a Bull Frog +Croaks Every Night.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">[26]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Our Chestnut Rack</h3> + +<p>Two Irishmen held up a Scotchman, who had +put up a terrific battle, but finally was overcome. +After the two Irishmen had gotten Sandy’s +pocketbook, which was tied up with a stout +string, they ran away.</p> + +<p>Unwinding the string and poking his fingers +into the corners of the thing, Pat finally located +a solitary five cent piece. Looking at it a moment +in silence, he turned to his companion and +said, “My gausch, Mike, suppose he’d had a +dime, he would have killed both of us.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Here’s to the good old sea gull,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">That cleans up Frisco’s Bay;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With a tummy full of sardines</div> + <div class="verse indent2">He flies to San Jose.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>To Molly of Havana</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Mia Mamacita, she’s una grande fool;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She makes me hot tamale,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Then sets it out to cool.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Our Monthly Motto</h3> + +<p>“A girl in your arms is worth two on the +’phone.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Did you hear the joke about the spoiled +mulligan?”</p> + +<p>“No.”</p> + +<p>“’Stoo bad, ’stoo bad.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">[27]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Motorcycle Mike</h3> + +<p>Mike and Pat went motorcycle riding one +evening. All of a sudden they had a collision. +Two hours later Pat recovered consciousness in +a hospital and learned that Mike had been +killed.</p> + +<p>“He should have been dead long ago,” remarked +Pat, wryly, “he saw two bright lights +ahead of him and the dang fool said to me: +‘Watch me sneak through there.’”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>At Havana Races</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The old sport stood on a grand stand chair,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">There was muck in his whiskers and coots in his hair,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But his voice rang out in the afternoon air:</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“She’ll win in a walk, bejabers.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“She’s from blue blooded stock—can’t go slow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Out of Black Bess by Hungry Joe;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Their money’s on her—those who know,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For she’ll win in a walk, bejabers.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“She got off behind—at the turn was third</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Worked up to second, then slipped like a bird</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Fell in a ditch, when hit by the switch,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And she wasn’t in it, bejabers.”</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Pardon Me—</h3> + +<p>“I beg your pardon,” cried the convict as the +governor passed his cell.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="bold"><i>I wish I was the Warden’s daughter.</i></p> + +<p class="bold"><i>How come?</i></p> + +<p class="bold"><i>There’s always men hangin’ around.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">“<i>My wife’s tongue is so long she doesn’t have to use a +towel to wash her face.</i>”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">[28]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Traveling Man</h3> + +<p>I register, most any old hotel, some bug +cage, fire trap with glue plant smell. In darkened +hall I seek the number on the door, and +find the bed—a sea of tumbled rags, used many +nights before. And often I must lend my aid +to drowsy, hook-worm chambermaid, who +spreads and shakes and smoothes and tucks and +toils and sweats to make it well—then I jump +in and tear it all t’ell!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container bold"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>They were always happy until a stranger wrecked their lives,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>For she went back to the laundry, and he went back to his wife.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Song of Newlywed</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I must go home tonight,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh, I must go home tonight,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I don’t care if it’s snowing,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Blowing, I’m going,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I got married only this morning,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And it fills me with delight,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I’ll stay out as long as you want next week,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But I must go home tonight.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>For verily he that sitteth upon a toad stool +shall arise again.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Might as well hitch my wagon to a star,” +said the drunken teamster, as he passed his +rope around the lamp-post.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">[29]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>What Is All the Noise About?</h3> + +<p>The barber is shaving himself.</p> + +<p>But why the argument?</p> + +<p>He is trying to talk himself into having a +massage.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Blank Verse</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">He had worked six months</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In a ship yard,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And was worried</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For fear they would hurt</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The baby,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The day of the Baptism</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When they hit him,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Over the head with the bottle.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>He went in to church the first time and they threw +water on him; the second trip they threw rice on him; the +third time was the charm; they threw dirt on him.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Back Porch Cross Fire</h3> + +<p>“Fire, Fire,” said Mrs. McGuire.</p> + +<p>“Where, Where?” said Mrs. Blair.</p> + +<p>“Downtown,” said Mrs. Brown.</p> + +<p>“S’ help us and save us,” said Mrs. Davis.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Penalty</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Between women and wine</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A man is not so smart,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For wine makes his headache,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And women his heart.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>I never looked up my family tree but I know +that I’m the sap.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">[30]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>’Twas Sweet of Her</h3> + +<p>“Sweetheart,” gushed his bride, “the grocery +stores were all closed today, and—”</p> + +<p>“I suppose I don’t get any dinner,” he cut +in, eyeing his true love hungrily.</p> + +<p>“No, my darling,” she gurgled, “the confectionery +was open, and I’ve made you some nourishing +jelly bean soup.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>In the Army</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">He missed on four,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Crapped out on six,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Put in his own dice,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And hit twenty licks.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>We went to a fair the other evening for the +benefit of the church and took chances on everything +but did not win a prize. About twelve +o’clock, as I was leaving a friend told me to +stick around and I did for an hour and one +o’clock.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Wild Guy</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller sans"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Clarence is a devilish boy,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He loves his sarsaparilla,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He drank two bottles yesterday</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Then smashed his umbrella.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Boo Hoo, Blooey</h3> + +<p>She—When I die you’ll never find another +woman like me.</p> + +<p>He—Well, you can take it from me, I’m not +going to try.</p> + +<hr> + +<h2><i><span class="smaller">True</span><br> +Confessions</i></h2> + +<p class="center bold"><i>A Fawcett Publication</i></p> + +<p class="center larger bold"><i>$10,000 Short Story Contest!</i></p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 600px;"> +<img src="images/check.jpg" width="600" height="275" alt="A Fawcett Publications +check for $10,000, made out to the True Confessions Contest Fund"> +</div> + +<p>Within a few weeks <i>True Confessions</i>, a Fawcett Monthly magazine, will make its appearance +on the news stands of the United States and Canada with a new purpose and new ideas. We +live in the field for distinctively interesting based-on-fact stories of 1,000 to 10,000 words, and +offer contributors—</p> + +<ul> +<li><b>Two grand prizes of $1,000 each.</b></li> +<li><b>Two second prizes of $300 each.</b></li> +<li><b>Two third prizes of $200 each.</b></li> +<li><b>Twenty prizes of $100 each.</b></li> +<li><b>Fifty prizes of $50 each.</b></li> +<li><b>One Hundred prizes of $25 each.</b></li> +</ul> + +<p>The contest is divided into two sections. The first section closes June 30, 1922 and +manuscripts which fail to win prizes in the first section will be entered in the second section +automatically, and thus early contestants will have a second chance. The second section +closes Oct. 1, 1922.</p> + +<table> + <tr> + <td><p class="center">FIRST SECTION</p></td> + <td><p class="center">SECOND SECTION</p></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><p class="center bold">(Contest closes June 30, 1922)</p></td> + <td><p class="center bold">(Contest closes Oct. 1, 1922)</p></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td> + <ul> + <li><b>$1,000 Grand prize</b></li> + <li><b>$300 Second prize</b></li> + <li><b>$200 Third prize</b></li> + <li><b>Ten prizes of $100 each</b></li> + <li><b>Twenty-five prizes of $50 each</b></li> + <li><b>Fifty prizes of $25 each.</b></li> + </ul> + </td> + <td> + <ul> + <li><b>$1,000 Grand prize</b></li> + <li><b>$300 Second prize</b></li> + <li><b>$200 Third prize</b></li> + <li><b>Ten prizes of $100 each</b></li> + <li><b>Twenty-five prizes of $50 each</b></li> + <li><b>Fifty prizes of $25 each</b></li> + </ul> + </td> + </tr> +</table> + +<p><b><i>Suggestions</i></b>: Confessions of a Magdalene, Confessions of a Jimmy Valentine, Confessions of +a Maniac, Confessions of a Dope Fiend, Confessions of Faithless Love, Confessions of Hate. +All stories must be <i>unusual</i>. <i>True Confessions</i> will not consider cut and dried fiction. We will +take our readers into the <i>inner chambers of real life</i>. Unless otherwise requested, writers’ names +will not be published. All manuscripts not prize winners will be purchased at space rates +upon acceptance.</p> + +<p>Further information will be supplied on request. Manuscripts should be addressed to—</p> + +<p class="center">W. H. FAWCETT, Editor,<br> +<i>True Confessions</i><br> +ROBBINSDALE. <span class="spacer">MINNESOTA.</span></p> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">[31]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2>Whiz Bang Editorials</h2> + +<p class="by"><i>“The Bull is Mightier Than the Bullet.”</i></p> + +</div> + +<p class="dropcap">When we were a soakey-nosed kid in +Grand Forks, North Dakota, our teacher +taught us a poem headed “Abou Ben +Adhem,” which went something like this, “Then +count me among those who love his fellowmen.”</p> + +<p>It appears that old Abou Ben Adhem hadn’t +been listed among those in the angel’s Book of +Gold, having a sure ticket through St. Peter’s +gates, and for that reason the old fellow merely +wanted to be charted among the Dead Game +Sports who were square to their fellows; who +judged not that they be not judged; that, being +pure, to them all things were pure. The Abou +Ben Adhem legend concluded by the angel making +a return the next night and listing this old +time legendary Sport on Page One of the Book +of Gold.</p> + +<p>Riley Grannan, who died in April, 1908, at +Rawhide, Nevada, was one of these Dead Game +Sports, and while we can’t all be angels and see +through the eyes of Billy Sunday and Doctor +Crafts and lead the ordained exemplary life, +<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_32"></a><a id="Page_34"></a>[34]</span>we can take a tip from the life of Riley Grannan +and be Dead Game Sports no matter what +path in life we follow.</p> + +<p>Although it has been fourteen years since +he passed into the Great Beyond, his kindly +deeds and noble character centralizes conversation +on the Havana race track and at all other +turf gatherings.</p> + +<p>Just a few brief explanatory remarks before +we publish from an old issue of a Nevada +newspaper the story of Grannan’s burial. This +Dead Game Sport was a famous race track +plunger and his bets ran as high as $200,000 on +a single race, and the following is respectfully +dedicated to “The Gang”—that bunch of carefree +fellows who follow the lure of the turf. +Riley Grannan was one of them in life, and no +greater tribute could be paid him than that +found in the desire of the “gang” that these, the +last words spoken over his bier, should be preserved. +None can read them without gleaning +some inspiration, for they cannot fail to strike +a harmonious chord upon the heart-strings of +the coldest soul. As chronicled by Jeanne C. +Grainger—</p> + +<div class="blockquote"> + +<p>Rawhide, Nev., April 15, 1908—Half shielded under +an oil-cloth blanket, lodged in a common express wagon, +the casket of Riley Grannan was carried recently down +dusty Rawhide avenue and along Nevada street from +the tented establishment of the camp’s undertaker to an +improvised memorial chapel, a variety theatre at the +rear of a saloon.</p> + +<p>There congregated a throng in silks and corduroys, +women of metropolitan costumes, miners covered with +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">[35]</span>high-grade grime, prospectors sun-tanned, brokers, bankers, +merchants, promoters, owners of saloons, bartenders, +gamblers, rounders. Tears that were shed dropped from +the eyes of all. Again, as always in mining camps, class +forgotten, all men were equal.</p> + +<p>A solemn hush came down upon the little playhouse +where last night and tonight, jostling crowds drank and +smoked while listening to doubtful wit from the coarse +jesters, men and women on the variety forum. Hovered +about the bier of Riley Grannan, race track plunger of +national renown, was as solemn a group of sincere mourners +as ever gathered to pay final tribute.</p> + +<p>Solos were offered by Mrs. Hedricks, once an actress +of wide fame, now wife of the editor of a Rawhide daily +paper, and by Jack Hines, miner of Alaska, and leaser of +Rawhide. Punctuations came with resounding blasts +from a score of mines on the mountains just above. +Saloons were closed and the streets were silent throughout +the service. At its end a solemn cortege trudged +with the remains, destined by automobile to travel thirty +miles to Schurz, there to go aboard the cars to Riley’s +brother in Kentucky.</p> + +<p>Unique beyond experience and dramatic beyond compare +was the eulogy pronounced by H. W. Knickerbocker, +once a clergyman, then a mine operator of Goldfield, +later a Rawhide pioneer. Hardly orthodox, but +wholly in keeping with the scene and the mute desires +of the dead, was the orator’s appearance. The once pulpit +exponent stood beside the lily-laden bier, his eyes bedimmed +with tears, his voice choked with a fraternal +emotion, he was shod in high boots and clothed in the +rough garb of a miner. A stenographic report of the +eulogy follows:</p> + +<p>“I feel that it is incumbent upon me to state that I +now occupy no ministerial or prelatic position. I am +only a prospector. I make no claims to moral merit +whatever or to religious authority except it be the religion +of the brotherhood of man. I wish to be taken +only as a man among men, feeling that I can shake hands +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">[36]</span>and style as my brother the most humble of you all. If +there may come from me a word of moral admonition, +it springs not from a sense of moral superiority, only +from the depths of my experience.</p> + +<p>“Riley Grannan was born at Paris, Ky., about forty +years ago. He cherished all the dreams of boyhood. +Those dreams found their fruition in phenomenal success +financial. I am told that from the position of a bellboy +in a hotel, he arose to be a celebrity of world wide fame. +Riley Grannan was one of the greatest plungers the continent +has produced. He died day before yesterday at +Rawhide.</p> + +<p>“That is a brief statement. We have his birth, and +the day of his demise. Who can fill the interim? Not +I. Who can tell his hopes and fears? Who knows the +mystery of his quiet hours? Not I.</p> + +<p>“Riley Grannan was born in the sunny southland of +Kentucky. He died in Rawhide. That is the beginning. +That is the end. Is there in this picture of what Ingersoll +said at the grave of his brother, ‘Whether it be near +the shore, or in mid-ocean, or among the breakers, at the +last a rock must mark the end of one and all.’</p> + +<p>“Born where brooks and rivers run musically through +prolific soil, where magnolia gladiflora, like white stars, +glow in a firmament of green, where lakes, the greensward +and the softest summer breezes dimple the wavelets, +where the air is resonant with the melody of a +thousand sweet-voiced birds and redolent of the perfume +of blooming flowers, that was the beginning. Riley Grannan +died in Rawhide, where in winter the tops of the +mountains are clothed in garments of ice and in summer +the blistering rays of the sun beat down upon the skeleton +of the desert.</p> + +<p>“Is there in this a picture of universal life? Sometimes, +when I look upon the circumstances of life there +comes to my lips a curse. I relate to you only my views. +If these run counter to yours, believe that what I say +is sincere. When I see the ambitions of man defeated, +when I see him struggling with mind and body to accomplish +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">[37]</span>his end, when I see his aim and purpose frustrated +only by a fortuitous combination of circumstances +over which he can exert no control, when I see his outstretched +hands about to grasp the flag of victory, and to +seize instead the emblem of defeat, I ask, ‘What is life?’ +Dreams, awakening, death. Life is a pendulum betwixt +a smile and a fear. Life is but a momentary halt within +the waste and then the nothing we set out from. Life is +a shadow, a poor player that struts and then is heard +no more. Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound, +signifying nothing. Life is a child-blown bubble that +but reflects the shadow of its environment and is gone, +a mockery, a sham, a lie, a fool’s vision, its happiness +but Dead Sea apples, its pain the crunching of a tyrant’s +heel. Omar says it better when he says: ‘We are but +a moving row of magic shadow shapes that come and go, +around with a sunny lumined lantern held in midnight +for the master of the shore, but helpless pieces of the +game we play on the checkerboard of night and day; +hither and thither moved or checks or slaves, and one by +one back into the closet laid. The ball, no question, +makes of eyes or nose, but here or there, as strikes the +player, goes. But he that tossed you down into the field; +He knows, He knows.’ He knows, but I don’t. That’s +my mood. Not so with Riley Grannan.</p> + +<p>“If I have gauged his character correctly, he accepted +the circumstances surrounding him as the mystic officials +to whom the universe had delegated its whole office +concerning him. He took defeat and victory with equal +equanimity. He was a man of placid exterior. His +meteoric past shows him invincible in spirit and it is +not irreverently that I proclaim him a dead game sport. +When I use that phrase I do so filling it as full of practical +human philosophy as it will hold. Riley Grannan +fully exemplified the philosophy of those fugitive verses, +‘It’s easy enough to be happy when life goes along like +a song; but the man worth while is the man who will +smile when everything goes wrong; for the test of the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">[38]</span>heart is trouble, and it always comes with the years; +and the smile that is worth the homage of each is the +smile that shines through tears.’</p> + +<p class="bold">“There are those who will condemn him. They believe +that today he is reaping the reward of misspent life. +They are those who are dominated by mediaeval creeds. +Them I am not addressing. They are ruled by the skeleton +hand of the past. They fail to see the moral side +of a character lived outside their puritanical ideas. Riley +Grannan’s goodness was not of a type that reached its +highest manifestation in ceremonious piety. It found its +expression in the handclasp of friendship. It found its +voice in the word of cheer to a discouraged brother. His +were deeds of quiet charity. His were acts of manhood.</p> + +<p>“Riley Grannan lived in the world of sport. My +words are not minced because I am telling what I believe +to be true. It was the world of sport, sometimes +of hilarity, sometimes worse. He left the impress of +his character upon us all, and through the medium of +his financial power he was able with his money to +brighten the lives of all who knew him. He wasted his +money, so the world says; but did it ever occur to you +that the men and women of such class upon whom he +wasted it are yet men and women? A little happiness +brought into their lives means as much to them as happiness +carried into the lives of the straight and the good. +If you can take one ray of sunshine into the night life +and thereby carry a single hour of happiness, you are +a benefactor. Riley Grannan did this.</p> + +<p>“God confined not his sunbeams to the nourishing +of potatoes and corn. His scattering of sunshine was +prodigal. Contemplate. He flings the auroral beauties +round the cold shoulders of the north. He hangs the +quivering picture of the mirage above the palpitating +heart of the desert. He scatters the sunbeams like +shattered gold upon the bosom of a myriad of lakes that +gem the robe of nature. He spangles the canopy of night +with star jewels and silvers the world with the reflected +beams from on high. He hangs the gorgeous crimson +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">[39]</span>curtain of the occident across the sleeping room of the +sun. ‘God wakes the coy maid of the morning to step +timidly from her boudoir of darkness, to climb the steep +of the orient, to fling wide the gates of morning and to +trip o’er the landscape, kidding the flowers in her flight. +She arouses the world to herald with their music the +coming of her King, who floods the world with effulgent +gold.’ These are wasted sunbeams. Are they?</p> + +<p>“<i>I say to you that the man or woman who by the use of +money or power is able to smooth one wrinkle from the brow +of human care or to change one moan or sob into a song, or +to wipe away a tear, and to place in its stead a jewel of joy, +is a public benefactor. Such was Riley Grannan.</i></p> + +<p>“The time has come to say goodbye. For the friends +and loved ones not here to say the word, let me say +goodbye, old man. We will try to exemplify the spirit +of your life as we bear the grief at our parting. Words +fail me here. Let those flowers, Riley, with their petaled +lips and perfumed breath, speak in beauty and fragrance +these sentiments too tender for words. Goodbye.”</p> + +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Something Wrong</h3> + +<p>Little Willie—Ma, is Pop taking you out to +dinner tonight?</p> + +<p>Mother—Yes, then to the theatre.</p> + +<p>Little Willie—What’s the matter?</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Help! Help!</h3> + +<p>“Burglars! Burglars!” cried Jones, sticking +his head out of the window and yelling like +mad.</p> + +<p>“What’s the row, mister?” asked a passerby.</p> + +<p>“For heaven’s sake, friend, send a burglar +here—there’s a policeman in my cellar.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">[40]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Speaking of Colors</h3> + +<p>My nose is red only when I blow it; then +it’s blew.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“My dear man,” said the kind lady, “don’t +you know that whisky kills more men than bullets?”</p> + +<p>“I don’t dispute your word one bit,” the +tramp replied, “but for my part I would rather +be full of moonshine than bullets any day.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>She Said Thusly</h3> + +<p class="smaller">Manslaughter me with kisses, daddy, then crucify me +with love.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>Let us now sing that plaintive melody in three keys, +Ikey, Jakey, and Whiskey. The last key is where you get +the spirit of the song.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Beautiful Optics</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Her eyes were as black as jet,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">This charming girl I knew;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I kissed her, and her husband came,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Now mine are jet black too.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="bold">George Washington washed the country and +the reformers dried it.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Do you like Shakespearean roles?”</p> + +<p>“Our baker never handles them.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">They told me my flivver was twenty horsepower but +I’ve only been able to locate four plugs.</p> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">[41]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2><i>Smokehouse Poetry</i></h2> + +</div> + +<p><i>In one of our first issues Whiz Bang published ’Ostler +Joe, but our circulation was comparatively small at that time +and as a result many who sought the poem were disappointed. +Many requests for it, coupled with our inability to +supply back copies, will bring the poem back to these pages +next month. ’Ostler Joe was originally published under the +name of “Phryne’s Husband” and is a story of a broken +home.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Absolution</h3> + +<p class="center sans">By E. Nesbit.</p> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Three months had passed since she had knelt before</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The grate of the confessional, and he,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The priest, had wondered why she came no more</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To tell her sinless sins—the vanity</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Whose valid reason graced her simple dress,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The prayers forgotten, or the untold beads—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The little thoughtless words, the slight misdeeds,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Which made the sum of her unrighteousness.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">She was the fairest maiden in his fold,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With her sweet mouth and musical pure voice,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her deep gray eyes, her hair’s tempestuous gold,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her gracious, graceful figure’s perfect poise.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her happy laugh, her wild, unconscious grace,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her gentle ways to old, or sick, or sad,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The comprehending sympathy she had,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Had made of her the idol of the place.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">And when she grew so silent and so sad,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">So thin and quiet, pale and hollow-eyed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And cared no more to laugh and to be glad</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With other maidens by the waterside,</div> +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">[42]</span> <div class="verse indent0">All wondered; kindly grieved the elders were,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And some few girls went whispering about,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“She loves—who is it? Let us find it out?”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But never dared to speak of it to her.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But the priest’s duty bade him seek her out</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And say, “My child, why dost thou sit part?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Hast thou some grief? Hast thou some secret doubt?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Come and unfold to me thine inmost heart.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">God’s absolution can assuage all grief</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And all remorse and woe beneath the sun,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Whatever thou hast said, or thought or done,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The holy church can give thy soul relief.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">He stood beside her, young and strong, and swayed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With pity for the sorrow in her eyes,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Which, as she raised them to his own, conveyed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into his soul a sort of sad surprise.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">She answered, “I will come;” and so at last,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Out of the summer evening’s crimson glow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With heart reluctant and with footsteps slow,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into the cool, great, empty church she passed.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“By my own fault, my own grievous fault,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I cannot say, for it is not,” she said,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Kneeling within the gray stone chapel’s vault,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And on the ledge her golden hair was spread.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Love broke upon me in a dream; it came</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Without beginning, for to me it seemed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That never otherwise than as I dreamed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Through all my life this thing had been the same.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“I only knew my heart, entire, complete,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Was given to my other self, my love;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That I through all the world would gladly move</div> + <div class="verse indent0">So I might follow his adored feet.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I dreamed I had all earth, all time, all space,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And every blessing, human and divine;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But hated the possessions that were mine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And only cared for his beloved face.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“I never knew I loved him till that dream</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Drew from my eyes the veil, and left me wise.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">What I had thought was reverence grew to seem</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Only my lifelong love in thin disguise.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And in my dream it looked so sinless, too,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">So beautiful, harmonious, and right;</div> +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">[43]</span> <div class="verse indent0">The vision faded with the morning light,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The love will last as long as I shall do.”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“Child, have you prayed against it?” “Have I prayed?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Have I not clogged my very soul with prayer;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Stopped up my ears with sound of praying; made</div> + <div class="verse indent0">My very body faint with kneeling there</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Before the sculptured Christ, and all for this,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That when my lips can pray no more, and sleep</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Shuts my unwilling eyes, my love will leap</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To dreamland’s bounds, to meet me with his kiss!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“Avoid him? Ay, in dewy garden walk</div> + <div class="verse indent0">How often have I strayed, avoiding him,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And heard his voice mix with the common talk,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Yet never turned his way. My eyes grow dim</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With weeping over what I lose by day</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And find by night, yet never have to call</div> + <div class="verse indent0">My own. O God! is there no help at all—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">No hope, no chance, and no escapeful way?”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“And who is he to whom thy love is given?”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“What? Holy church demands to know his name?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">No rest for me on earth, no hope of heaven</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Unless I tell it? Ah, for very shame</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I cannot—yet why not?—I will—I can!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I have grown mad with brooding on my curse.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Here! Take the name; no better and no worse</div> + <div class="verse indent0">My case will be. Father, thou art the man!”</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">An icy shock shivered through all his frame—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">An overwhelming, cold astonishment;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But on the instant the revulsion came,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">His blood felt what her revelation meant.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Lord Christ,” his soul cried, while his heart beat fast,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Give strength in this, my hour of utmost need;”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And with the prayer strength came to him indeed,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And with calm voice he answered her at last:</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“Child, go in peace! Wrestle and watch and pray,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And I will spend this night in prayer for thee,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That God will take thy strange great grief away.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Thou hast confessed thy sin. Absolvo te.”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Silence most absolute a little while,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Then passed the whisper of her trailing gown</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Over the knee-worn stones, and soft died down</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The dim, deserted, incense-memoried aisle.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">All night he lay upon the chancel floor,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And coined his heart in tears and prayers, and new</div> +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">[44]</span> <div class="verse indent0">Strange longings he had never known before,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Her very memory so thrilled him through.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He lay so tempest-tossed, ’twas still without,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And moaned: “Oh, God! I love her, love her so!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh, for one spark of heaven’s fire to show</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Some way to cast this devils passion out!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“Christ, by Thy passion, by Thy death for men,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh, save me from myself, save her from me!”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And at the word the moon came out again</div> + <div class="verse indent0">From her cloud-palace, and threw suddenly</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A shadow from the great cross overhead</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Upon the priest; and with it came a sense</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of strength renewed, of perfect confidence</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In Him who on that cross for men hung dead.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">But as the ghostly moon began to fade,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And moonlight glimmered into ghostlier dawn,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The shadow that the crucifix had made</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With twilight mixed; and with it seemed withdrawn</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The peace that with its shadowy shape began,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And as the dim east brightened, slowly ceased</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The wild devotion that had filled the priest—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And with full sunlight he sprang up—a man!</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">He strode straight down the church and passed along</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The grave-set garden’s dewy grass-grown slope;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The woods about were musical with song,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The world was bright with youth, and love, and hope.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Soon would he see her—cry, “I am thine own,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As thou art mine, now, and forevermore!”</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And at her worshipped feet would kneel before,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And she should kiss the lips that had not known</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The kiss of love in any vanished year.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And as he dreamed of his secured delight,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">A mourning band, and in their midst a bier,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Round the curved road came slowly into sight.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He hastened to pass on; a covering-fold</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Veiled the dead, quiet face—and yet—and yet—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Did he not know that hand, so white and wet?</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Did he not know those dripping curls of gold?</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“We came to you to know what we should do,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Father, we found her body in the stream,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And how it happened, God knows!” One other knew—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Knew that of him had been her last wild dream—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Knew the full reason of that life-disdain—Knew</div> +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">[45]</span> <div class="verse indent0">how the shame of hopeless love confessed</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And unreturned had seemed to stain her breast,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Till only death should make her clean again.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">They left her in the church where sunbeams bright</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Gilded the wreathed oak and carven stone</div> + <div class="verse indent0">With golden floods of consecrating light;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And here at last, together and alone,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The lovers met, and here upon her hair</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He set his lips, and, dry-eyed, kissed her face,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And in the stillness of the holy place</div> + <div class="verse indent0">He spoke in tones of bitter, blank despair:</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">“Oh, lips so quiet, eyes that will not see!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh, clinging hands that not again will cling!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">This last poor sin may well be pardoned thee,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Since for the right’s sake thou hast done this thing.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Oh, poor weak heart, forever laid to rest,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">That could no longer strive against its face,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For thee high heaven will unbar its gate,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And thou shalt enter in and shalt be blessed.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent2">“The chances were the same for us,” he said,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">“Yet thou has won, and I have lost, the whole;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Thou would’s not live in sin, and thou art dead—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But I—against thee I have weighed my soul,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And, losing thee, have lost my soul as well.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I have cursed God, and trampled on His cross;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Earth has no measurement for all my loss,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But I shall learn to measure it in hell!”</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Do It Now</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">If with pleasure you are viewing any work a man is doing,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">If you like him or you love him; tell him now;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Don’t withhold your approbation ’til the parson makes oration</div> + <div class="verse indent4">And he lies with snowy lilies o’er his brow.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">For no matter how you shout it, he won’t really care about it;</div> + <div class="verse indent4">He won’t know how many teardrops you have shed;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If you think some praise is due him, now’s the time to slip it to him,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">For he cannot read his tombstone when he’s dead.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">More than fame and more than money is the comment kind and sunny,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">The hearty, warm approval of a friend,</div> +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">[46]</span> <div class="verse indent0">For it gives to life a savor and it makes you stronger, braver,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">And it gives you heart and spirit to the end.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">If he earns your praise—bestow it; if you like him—let him know it;</div> + <div class="verse indent4">Let the words of true encouragement be said;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Do not wait ’til life is over and he’s underneath the clover,</div> + <div class="verse indent4">For he</div> + <div class="verse indent12">cannot read</div> + <div class="verse indent24">his tombstone</div> + <div class="verse indent38">when he’s dead.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Vale Murdum Peride Vitam</h3> + +<p class="smaller"><i>This farewell message in verse was left by Dr. Sommers +of St. Louis, who took his own life at the Physicians and +Surgeons College.</i></p> + +<p class="center sans">By Dr. Osmund Sommers.</p> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Good night old world, good bye to all your joys,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Your sorrows, pleasures, passions, pomp and noise.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">I leave you now, for the eternal silence of the stars—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The deafness of unbounded space,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where bars no longer hold the soul in durance vile,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where naught can wound and nothing can defile,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the pure spirit shall despise the things</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The sense on earth hath loved on wings.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Bathed in the ether of eternity,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">How sweet to feel from every passion free!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And yet, it is an awful leap to take</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Into the great unknown! Perchance to wake</div> + <div class="verse indent0">To greater woes indeed than we have</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And hoped to bury in the silent grave.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But still, the great majority is there!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Or tremble when the hour supreme has come.</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The grave at least, gives rest from trouble here,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And may we hope for sweet oblivion there.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">When Charon, come! I signal thee tonight!</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Come, row me o’er the Styx! I’ve lost the fight.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>If a thing is worth having, it’s worth fighting +for.</p> + +<p>On that principle the institution of marriage +is founded.</p> + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">[47]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2><i>Knickerbocker Spice</i></h2> + +</div> + +<p class="dropcap">New York is so dull in comparison with +the Hollywood film colony, with its mad +quest for joy at any cost, that we are +rather ashamed to present the more or less dull +events of the month.</p> + +<p>The once-so-gay film parties—alas—are very +circumspect these days. Although a recent one +nearly resulted in newspaper headlines. It +seems that the affair was given in honor of a +star on a visit from the coast. Said star’s +younger brother brought along a feminine +friend who imbibed the stuff that Mr. Volstead +thought he had absolutely prohibited. Probably +it wasn’t <i>exactly</i> the stuff, for the lady became +violently ill. With memories of the +Arbuckle episode before them, the guests +hastily departed. The visitor recovered but the +party was as ruined as the heroine in the old-time +melodrama.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Most of the screen players seem to be +planning to go abroad. Nobody can tell +exactly when one’s letters or telegrams +or something may be unearthed after some +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">[48]</span>quiet little informal murder in Hollywood. +Here we might add that the vogue for monogrammed +nighties has completely disappeared.</p> + +<p>We can’t exactly blame anyone for going, +not when we hear of the giddy, carefree life on +the other side—if you have the necessary +wherewithall. For instance, a chap just back +from Paris told me the other day of the Bal des +Quatz Arts, the annual student art revel of the +Latin Quarter.</p> + +<p>Tickets are hard to get, for the real Quarter +inhabitants decline to let it develop into a sightseeing +affair. However, a friend secured the +tickets and the two chaps invited a duo of +pretty little models of the studios. Everyone +was supposed to go in Carthaginian costume—whatever +that is. The Americans secured attire +claimed by the renters to be strictly 100 per +cent Carthaginian and then they went around +after the models. Mimi and Fleurette were +waiting when they drew up in one of those +queer Paris taxis. And Mimi and Fleurette +were attired in conventional cloaks. Dainty +dance slippers gleamed from beneath. The +Americans had been wondering what a feminine +Carthaginian costume would be and they were +disappointed—momentarily.</p> + +<p>Mimi and Fleurette expressed hunger on +reaching the hall and the Americans gallantly +proferred a supper invitation. Imagine their +surprise when Mimi and Fleurette tossed aside +their cloaks and revealed that their costumes +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">[49]</span>were simple golden belts. Nor were the feminine +costumes of other young women in and +about the two models any more elaborate.</p> + +<p>Later, at the ball itself, the Americans +found reproductions of famous statuary groups +posed by living models, the elect of the studios. +It goes without saying that the statuary later +came to life and danced with the others all +night.</p> + +<p>The ball concluded with a beauty contest. +And it was a real beauty contest, for there +were none of the advantages or camouflages +provided by the modiste. “Not even a beaded +eyelash was permitted as a costume,” my friend +tells me. The festivities concluded when everyone +went out on the boulevard and plunged into +a nearby fountain. After that the Carthaginians +retired to their studios and garrets. A +pleasant time was had by all.</p> + +<p>Yes, Paris has its attractions. Ruby de +Remer, the famous screen beauty, has just returned +from that piquant village with trunks +and trunks of black negligee, the latest vogue +in France. You should have viewed those +gleaming black robes de nuit!</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Another tale we hear is of a lavish and +decorative nest belonging to a well known +manager and located beneath his theater +in New York. The place is beautifully furnished +with treasures from the Continent and +Asia. Divans of fabulous value adorn the +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">[50]</span>place. So do incense burners from the Far +East, tapestries that date back to the middle +ages and jeweled keepsakes that may have belonged +to rajahs. Back of the place is a modern +kitchen, where suppers are prepared for +the manager’s guests. It is all very atmospheric— But +words fail us. We leave you to +draw your own picture. Soft music, soft +divans, soft viands....</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">Then there’s Erich von Stroheim’s million +dollar movie, “Foolish Wives,” for instance. +This has been a picture after the +censors’ own heart. The hero is a degenerate +Russian count who drinks perfume, lives with +two pretty adventuresses, ru-u-ins a serving +maid, tries to capture an American ambassador’s +wife and is only prevented by a fire, and +ends by being killed when he climbs into the +bedroom of a half-witted peasant girl. The ambassador’s +wife, by the way, leaps from a balcony +to escape the fire and has the first premature +baby ever noted in the films. You can +imagine how the censors tackled this material.</p> + +<p>The baby must have puzzled them. They +apparently are found on the back porch—or +somewhere. The censors didn’t seem to know +what to do about it, for the premature child +was shown at the film premiere. Later it disappeared.</p> + +<p>The producers themselves cut some 200,000 +feet out of von Stroheim’s original negative to +<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">[51]</span>get the story down to these ornate essentials. +It is said that someone has offered the producers +$50,000 for the cut out portions, with a +view towards showing them in sections of +Europe and South America where the cinema +flickers can’t be too strong for ’em.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="dropcap">The theatrical events have not been at all +intriguing. The stage year, which started +with such a sprightly trend that police +intervention not only seemed likely but actually +occurred, has petered out to a mild termination. +Even a reformer wouldn’t be horrified at +anything among the late events—at least not +much.</p> + +<p>Of course, there was Lillian Lorraine’s return, +after we had read columns and columns +about her paralysis from an injured or broken +spine. In “The Blue Kitten” Lillian wears +costumes that reveal her spinal column to be +in fine form to the last vertibrae.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>A Problem in Figures</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">Some girls are naughty;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Others are naught.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">I’m not the soda jerker in this drug store, madam, I’m +the head bartender.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">He—I dreamed I proposed to a beautiful girl.</p> + +<p class="smaller">Dizzy Blonde—What did I say.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">[52]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>John D.’s Art</h3> + +<p>“Have you an oil painting of John D. Rockefeller?”</p> + +<p>“No, ma’am, no one has. He has never been +done in oil.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Ay, There’s the Rub</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>It isn’t the can that annoys the dog,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>It’s the fact that it’s tied to his tail.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>It isn’t the troubles that make life hard,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>It’s the number of them that you fail.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>It isn’t the time you waste on her,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Nor the thriftless gold you spend,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>But the cold and unrelenting kick</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Dad hands you in the end.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Waiter,” growled a customer, “I should like +to know the meaning of this! Yesterday I was +served with a portion of pudding twice the size +of this.”</p> + +<p>“Indeed, sir!” replied the waiter. “Where +did you sit?”</p> + +<p>“By the window,” answered the customer.</p> + +<p>“Oh, that explains it!” said the waiter. “We +always give the people at the window a large +helping. It’s a good advertisement!”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>College Humor</h3> + +<p>He (trying to make conversation)—“Have +you many fast friends?”</p> + +<p>She (Indignantly)—“Sir! I’m not that kind +of a girl.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">[53]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Purple Cow’s Best One</h3> + +<p>Cleo—“When Bill danced with me last night +he kept letting his hand slip down my back.”</p> + +<p>Patricia—“I hope you rebuked him.”</p> + +<p>Cleo—“I did; I told him to keep it up.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">“Liza, what fo’ yo’ buy dat odder box of shoe +blackin’?”</p> + +<p class="smaller">“Go on, nigga’, dat ain’t shoe blackin’; dat’s ma massage +cream.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Flamingo</h3> + +<p class="center smaller">(Dennison University.)</p> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>There is a cat in our home,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>And it is wondrous fat;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>It don’t have any kittens ’cause</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>It ain’t that kind of cat.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>That sure is horse meat they serve in that +restaurant.</p> + +<p>Why, how do you know?</p> + +<p>Well, I ordered a steak and just as I took a +bite some teamster on the street hollered +“Whoa” and that meat stuck right in my throat.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">Was the dance a success?</p> + +<p class="smaller">Yes, roughly speaking.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Froth reports a successful banquet at a +University of Pennsylvania fraternity house. +A couple of the alumni were revenue officers.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Manicure Story</h3> + +<p class="bold">“There is a divinity that shapes our ends, +rough-hew them as we may.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">[54]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Let Us Sing</h3> + +<p>Put away the tweezers till our eyebrows +meet again.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">“Fleeced again,” said the lamb, as he kicked at the +high top boots.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>A demi-virgin</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>So I’m told</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Is bold</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>And needs no urgin’.</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Aye, but mon,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Wouldn’t you</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Love to</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Love a demi-john?</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Stevie has a stiff job. He’s working at the +morgue.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“I could live on limburger cheese alone.”</p> + +<p>“You’d have to.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">The early bird catches the worm</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Of that there is no question.</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But if the worm should chance to turn</div> + <div class="verse indent0">M’gosh, some indigestion!</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Old maids always imagine there is a man in +the house at night. But married women know +better.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Good Morning, Eve!</h3> + +<p class="smaller"><i>So Eve looked over her shoulder at the Serpent and said, +“I’d take your Juicy Fruit if you weren’t so wrigley.”</i></p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">[55]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Our Monthly Motto</h3> + +<p>Love one woman at a time, all children, and +some men.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>I ran into a girl with my Ford—made a hit—so I picked +her up.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Pete and I had quite an argument the other +day which we’ll let our readers settle. He insisted +that there were more women than men +married last year.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Another Soap Song</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>A masher stopped a pretty girl;</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Says she to him, “Oh, Shucks,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Wash your neck with Bon Ami,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>That may improve your Lux.”</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller bold">Wife—Jakey! Jakey! dars a burgular under the bed.</p> + +<p class="smaller bold">Jakey—Sh-Sh-s-s-s, not a word; ve vill charge him +for the night’s lodging.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“Golightly” Morrill writes that the girls in +Egypt have plenty of speed but no control.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller"><i>When I got off the train at Miami the red cap was assuring—“Carry +yo’ bag, Boss? Never bus’ a bottle yet.”</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Add Fairy Tales</h3> + +<p>“I was so lonesome, dear, while you were +away that I went to bed every night at nine +o’clock.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">[56]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Psychology Test</h3> + +<p>Puppet prints for the first time the results of the +astounding psychological tests recently made by Prof. +Ivan Awful Line, for Puppet. Anyone giving good reasons +why these answers are correct will be awarded the +Helium Medal for irresponsibles, the Sacred Cross of the +Pink Polecats and the Ragged Ribbon of the Remingtons.</p> + +<p>First Question. What would you do if you found +yourself in an airtight room containing a mad dog, a +rattlesnake and a pair of sleigh-bells?</p> + +<p>Answer. Invariably you would grasp the rattlesnake +by the hind leg and rattle him, thus scaring the dog. +Now you have the dog rattled. Now toll the bells for a +period of 93 seconds, and at once determine what the +bells told. Then, at the psychological moment, sleigh the +dogs with bells—I. C. S.</p> + +<p>Second Question. Supposing you had nothing to eat +for three years. Suddenly you come upon a grocery store. +On the outside of the store is a stand containing large, +juicy, red apples. You steal one, and looking up, see a +policeman. What would you do?</p> + +<p>Answer. Run into the store, jump on a scale, and get +a weigh.</p> + +<p>Third Question. An Indian with a club foot, unable +to walk, is stranded in the Sahara Desert sixty-two and +three-thirds miles from a Child’s Restaurant, with one +pancake in his possession. How will he keep from +starving?</p> + +<p>Answer. In the absence of a Child’s Restaurant, he +can eat a man’s lunch by the following means. First detach +the Indian club from his foot, and with it puncture +a large hole in the pancake. He can now eat the pancake, +have the hole of it left, and have the Sahara for +desert.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">[57]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Pelican Stuff</h3> + +<p>Does she dance badly?</p> + +<p>Yes, if the chaperones aren’t looking.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>“My supper’s cold!”</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>He swore with vim,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>And then she made it</i></div> + <div class="verse indent2"><i>Hot for him.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">My girl is so dumb she thinks an aspirin tablet is +writing paper.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="bold"><i>Sun Dodger says you always can draw the +Queens if you have got the Jack.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Oh, That’s Fine</h3> + +<p>Lieutenant—Whoinell put these flowers on +this table.</p> + +<p>Sergeant—The Commanding officer, sir.</p> + +<p>Lieutenant—Pretty flowers, aren’t they.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>San Francisco dentist married a manicure +girl and now they are fighting tooth and nail.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Hang This On the Door Knob</h3> + +<p class="bold"><i>The Creator gave you two ears and only one +tongue, so you could hear twice as much as you +say.</i></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>How Careless of Him</h3> + +<p class="center smaller">(From the Clearville Independent.)</p> + +<p class="smaller sans">FOUND: at my home on 1820 Hunt avenue, gentleman’s sterling +cigarette case. Owner may have same by calling again.</p> + +<p class="smaller sans right">—John Snow.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">[58]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Ikey’s Mental Race Track</h3> + +<p>Ikey, our Jewish farm hand, was telling us +the other night how smart his father was. He +said his old man’s fortune was started as the +outcome of a train wreck in which both his +father and mother were in.</p> + +<p>“Vy, fadder had sich a qvick mind that ven +he saw mudder vas not hurt in the wreck he +kicked her so hard in the face that he collected +twenty-five tousand dollars damages.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>When woman was made out of man’s rib +someone pulled a bone.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>My wife can make it so good now at home +that she calls it “the beer that makes Milwaukee +jealous.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>I’ve got the Bakery Shop Blues because I +kneed the dough.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Punch Bowl</h3> + +<p>“Marion certainly must be a good girl.”</p> + +<p>“Why so?”</p> + +<p>“Her name came up in the barber shop last +night and no one knew anything about her.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Resident—“Ah, a letter from my wife.”</p> + +<p>Visitor—“But there’s no writing on the paper.”</p> + +<p>Resident—“No, we’re not on speaking +terms.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">[59]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Simple Arithmetic</h3> + +<p>Deacon Jones recently flivvered his eleven +children to our village photographer.</p> + +<p>“How much you charge for a photograph?” +he asked.</p> + +<p>“Eighteen dollars a dozen,” replied the cameraman.</p> + +<p>“Good-bye,” said Jones, as he hustled his +youngsters outside, “I’ll be back next year.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>A Chafing Dish</h3> + +<p>“Phat’s a chafing dish?” asked O’Brien of +O’Toole.</p> + +<p>“A chafing dish,” answered O’Toole to +O’Brien, “is a fryin’ pan thot’s got into society.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Bull Colossal</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">In rage the bull colossal rears</div> + <div class="verse indent0">His giant form against the god,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Well, Taurus, well thou spurn’st the sod</div> + <div class="verse indent0">In that huge plunge of million years.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>It takes a diplomat to enter a barber shop +and come out with no more than he went in for.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller">I hate to play billiards with three balls as I dislike to make fun +out of any one’s business.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>The great man waved aside all objections. +“Let ’em in,” he cried, pointing to a delegation +from the barbers’ union. “I knew ’em when +they were little shavers.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">[60]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Animal Tales</h3> + +<div class="smaller"> + +<p>I thought you told me that dog of yours at the house +was a good rat dog.</p> + +<p>He sure is, Sam, he sure is.</p> + +<p>Well, how come, when I passed there this morning +that the dog was drinking milk out of a bowl with ten or +eleven big rats drinking out of it, too?</p> + +<p>Are you sure that was my house?</p> + +<p>Sure am.</p> + +<p>Well, you sure it was my dog?</p> + +<p>Positively.</p> + +<p>Well, then, you see those are our rats, but let any +strange rats come around and he will take care of them +all right.</p> + +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p class="smaller bold">When a fellow is allowed to muss a girl’s hair he +considers it a net gain. She considers it a net loss.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">There was a grass widow quite proper;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Who formally married A. Hopper;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But he got a divorce;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">As a matter of course,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">The grass widow is now a grass-hopper.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Old Stuff</h3> + +<p>At twenty a kiss is an experiment, at forty +a sentiment and after that—a compliment.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>“I believe in specialists, b’heck,” said Hep +White. “When my heart is bad I go to a heart +specialist. When my lungs are bad I go to a +lung specialist,—”</p> + +<p>“Them’s my sentiments, too,” interrupted +Mrs. Wilkins. “Take my boy, Jimmie. When +his tonsils bothered I took him to a regular tonsorial +artist.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">[61]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Doggonit</h3> + +<p>A farmer friend of mine was standing in +the road with a gun tucked under his arm and +an old dog at his side. He was directly in the +path of a motor car. The chauffeur sounded +his horn, but the dog did not move—until he +was struck. After that he did not move.</p> + +<p>The automobile stopped and one of the men +got out and came forward. He had once paid +a farmer $10.00 for killing a calf that belonged +to another farmer. This time he was wary.</p> + +<p>“Was that your dog?”</p> + +<p>“Yes.”</p> + +<p>“You own him?”</p> + +<p>“Yes.”</p> + +<p>“Looks as if we’d killed him.”</p> + +<p>“Certainly looks so.”</p> + +<p>“Very valuable dog?”</p> + +<p>“Well, not so very.”</p> + +<p>“Will $5.00 satisfy you?”</p> + +<p>“Yes.”</p> + +<p>“Well, then, here you are.” He handed a +$5.00 bill to the man with the gun, and said +pleasantly, “I’m sorry to have broken up your +hunt.”</p> + +<p>“I wasn’t going hunting,” replied the other +as he pocketed the bill.</p> + +<p>“Not going hunting? Then what were you +doing with the dog and the gun?”</p> + +<p>“Going down to the river to shoot the dog.”</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">[62]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Rubbing It In</h3> + +<p>“My dear,” remarked Smith as they were +absorbing the beauties of the Grand Canyon. +“Nature is marvelous! Stupendous! When I +gaze at this vast expanse it makes me think +how puerile, how insignificant man is.” “Huh!” +sniffed his better half. “I knew that before we +ever came here.”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Men are like kerosene lamps; they are not +over bright, usually turned down, most always +smoke, and generally go out at night.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Then Maw Used the Rolling Pin</h3> + +<p>Little Johnny—“Maw, what did Paw mean +when he said to that man: ‘You’ve got a good +figure?’”</p> + +<p>Mama Hopkins—“I suppose he meant that +he got a good price for some land he sold.”</p> + +<p>Johnny—“Say, Maw, does Paw’s stenographer +sell land, too?”</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Good Yarn</h3> + +<p>“Darn sox!” exclaimed the young married +lady as she threw the yarn in the work basket.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Proficiency</h3> + +<p class="center smaller">(From Langsford (Pa.) Leader.)</p> + +<p class="smaller sans">On Thursday and Friday evenings of next week, “The Busy +Liar,” a comedy from start to finish, will be given. The local +members have been practicing for a long time.</p> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">[63]</span></p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>Insurance Bull</h3> + +<div class="smaller"> + +<p>We knew a man with an automobile, who said he was a +careful driver—</p> + +<p class="right">AND HE WAS!</p> + +<p>He said he would never injure anyone—</p> + +<p class="right">AND HE DIDN’T!</p> + +<p>He said if anything happened, it would be the other fellow’s +fault—</p> + +<p class="right">AND IT WAS!</p> + +<p>That didn’t prevent the other fellow from demanding +damages—</p> + +<p class="right">AND HE DID!</p> + +<p>Our man said it was not his fault and that he would not +pay anything—</p> + +<p class="right">AND HE DIDN’T!</p> + +<p>The other chap said: “I’ll sue you!”—</p> + +<p class="right">AND HE DID!</p> + +<p>Our friend’s lawyer said: “We can beat him in court”—</p> + +<p class="right">AND THEY DID!</p> + +<p>Whereupon our friend said: “Ha, Ha, I win!”—</p> + +<p class="right">AND THEN</p> + +<p>He paid his lawyer a fee of $100, plus expenses, and ran +his car the rest of the year at his own risk.</p> + +<p class="right">FOOLISH—WASN’T HE?</p> + +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<h3>The Meat Boy’s Love</h3> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">I never sausage eyes as thine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And if you’ll butcher hand in mine,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And liver round me ever day</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We’d seek some ham-let far away,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">We’d meat life’s frown with life’s caress,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">And cleaver road to happiness.</div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p>Men admire women for their beauty; respect +them for their virtue; adore them for their intelligence +and love them because they can’t +help it.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<div class="poetry-container smaller"> + <div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Hives rhyme with wives,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>In sound and letter match—</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>If I had both of these at once,</i></div> + <div class="verse indent0"><i>Ye Gods! I’d have to scratch.</i></div> + </div> + </div> +</div> + + +<hr> + +<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">[64]</span></p> + +<div class="bbox w40"> + +<h2>Our Rural Mail Box</h2> + +</div> + +<p><b><i>Ina Ficks</i></b>—The father always holds the gun +while brother gives the bride away.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Shilliday</i></b>—Sorry, we can’t use your story +entitled “I am onions for you, kid.” It’s too +strong.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Willet Hert</i></b>—Gyp, the fortune teller, can +get you in touch with departed spirits.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Lonely Wifie</i></b>—Don’t worry about your husband +while you are away. The chances are he +isn’t having a good time alone.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Will E. Koppitt</i></b>—When you are sitting in +an apartment and see a pretty ship go by it is +either time to clear the deck or pull in your +periscope.</p> + +<div class="starbreak">* * *</div> + +<p><b><i>Helen Butte</i></b>—You win, Helen. Your sweetheart +should get a job at herding sheep this +summer.</p> + +<hr> + +<div class="bbox w40 all-red"> + +<h2><i>Pedigreed Follies of 1921-22</i></h2> + +<p>256 pages of fun. The gems of 25 early +editions of Capt. Billy’s Whiz Bang. Stories, +toasts, poems, drippings and pot pourri +comprise this greatest Whiz Bang book.</p> + +<p class="center bold"><i>Only a Few Left</i></p> + +<p>If your newsdealer’s supply is exhausted, +pin a dollar bill, or your check, money +order or stamps to the coupon below and +receive this peppy collection.</p> + +<hr class="all-red"> + +<p class="hanging sans">Whiz Bang,<br> +Robbinsdale, Minnesota.</p> + +<p class="noindent">Gentlemen:</p> + +<p>Enclosed is dollar bill, check, money order or stamps +for $1.00 for which please send me the Winter Annual +of Captain Billy’s Whiz Bang, “Pedigreed Follies of +1921-22.”</p> + +<div class="form">Name</div> + +<div class="form">Address</div> + +</div> + +<hr> + +<div class="w20 red"> + +<p class="center larger"><i class="u all-red">Everywhere!</i></p> + +<p><i>Whiz Bang</i> is on sale +at all leading hotels, +news stands, 25 cents +single copies; on trains +30 cents, or may be +ordered direct from +the publisher at 25 +cents single copies; +two-fifty a year.</p> + +<p>One dollar for the +WINTER ANNUAL.</p> + +<div class="figcenter" style="width: 200px;"> +<img src="images/bull.jpg" width="200" height="75" alt="A bull"> +</div> + +</div> + +</main> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 78827 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/78827-h/images/bull.jpg b/78827-h/images/bull.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..95d03f3 --- /dev/null +++ b/78827-h/images/bull.jpg diff --git a/78827-h/images/check.jpg b/78827-h/images/check.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..f24573f --- /dev/null +++ b/78827-h/images/check.jpg diff --git a/78827-h/images/cover.jpg b/78827-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..49606d7 --- /dev/null +++ b/78827-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/78827-h/images/titlepage.jpg b/78827-h/images/titlepage.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a15dd24 --- /dev/null +++ b/78827-h/images/titlepage.jpg |
