Judge — September 15, 1917 — page 8: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Li SHOOT You "é IT ISHECESSAR, Culture Everywhere By DON HEROLD sf LANK! Blank! Blank! Blank!" It was the revolver in our left hand speaking. It was loaded with blanks. “Blank!” The revolver in our right hand was loaded with real lead, but it yet, was silent It was a conductor on top a Fifth Avenue Bus at whom we were shooting. Accidentally we had been resting our elbow on the push button on the side rail and had been stopping the bus at each corner for about five blocks. “GETCHER ELBOW OFF THAT BELL!” the conductor had yelled at us the full length of the bus Then it was we began to shoot, We shot five times, as mentioned above “Come here, our friend.” we said gently, “Throw up your hands and open your mind to a new idea.” The conductor did as instructed, at least with regard to coming nearer and throwing up his hands “There was no necessity for your roughness.” we said calmly. “We had no desire to keep our elbow on the push button. Since you have spoken to us about it, it isn’t an espe cially restful place for our elbow. And we are as anxious as body to have the bus move along as uninterruptedly as pos sible. You could have walked up here noiselessly and spoken to us quietly about the matter and we would have blushed with honest shame and apologized in a way that would have done your heart good. But you bawled us out in a way to embarrass not only us, personally, but every other person with sensibilit on top of this bus. Now the next time an elbow gets on a push button, you'll know better how to go about getting it off You are dismissed.” ‘The conductor hung his head and turned and walked away He was thinking deeply The man in the seat in front of us turned and grasped our hand warmly. “‘It’s a great idea.” he said. “Where did you get it? “Suggested to us by the war in Europe.” we said modestly. “Well, it’s fine.” Other passengers came up and congratulated us. They all thought our idea was a good one, and they all said that they, too, were going to get revolvers and use them in their daily lives. The bus was approaching a hardware store, and one large man suggested that we all get off and purchase revolvers with- out further delay. “The new pedagogy!” he said, laughingly. And everybody agreed. The conductor consented to hold the bus. The idea will probably spread So whenever you hear a shot in the night, hereafter, you may know that some stupid pilgrim is opening his mind to a new touch of sweetness and new rays of light THE CAT OUT OF THE BAG JOD EXPERTS have at last let the cat out of the bag. They have announced with a commendable degree of finality that “‘your stomach is the center of your efficiency.” They have openly admitted it on the front end of a return post- card We are glad to hear it. For some time we have been more than reasonably certain that efficiency doesn’t center in one’s head or even in one’s heart. We have always suspected that it is of base origin, and we are mightily pleased to know that its central offices are at least no higher than the stomach. The world can now begin to make allowance for some of the bilious conclusions that efficiency experts have thrown up lately. Efficiency will hereafter be looked upon as alimentary, and not elementary. When some scribbulous benefactor of the race usurps two or three pages of good space in a magazine in- tended for semi-intelligent people in an effort to get us to cor- relate eye-batting and sniffling to save time and to standardize the curvature of our toe-nails to induce our socks to give way like the wonderful one-hoss shay, we shall know that all he needs is a littke mechanotherapy on his tummy. And we shall feel more like giving it to him Of course we are sorrier than ever for our poor, oppressed stomachs, which already have entirely too much to put up with It’s hardly fair that the stomach be made the center of any- thing else. It is, and has been for some time, the center of most of our woe, our sleeplessness, and our poverty. To establish efficiency headquarters down there is grossly unfair, even if it is fitting. Nevertheless, we are more than willing that efficiency be centered in the stomach. If it is not too much trouble, we should like to have the learned experts arrange to keep it there. For the sake of all of us it must be kept away from the brain cavity and the tongue. When it is firmly fixed in its new headquarters, we shall move that all the doors be locked from the outside. Then we shall expect every little gastric juice to do his duty fearlessly H.W. Dee comicbooks.com