Judge — October 13, 1917 — page 6: what you’re looking at

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

THE JANITOR THe Janitor is an institution; just as chicken- pox and measles are common ills, he is a necessary ¢ There is nothing to prove that the original cave-dweller paid tribute to a janitorial Cerberus, but there is no question that his modern descendant is mulcted of his hard-earned dollars to sati the rapacity of this subterranean despot. While there is no apparent connection between this modern kellermeister and the Roman Janus, the first-named is equally as two-faced as was the ancient deity of the Latins, who, we read, was accustomed to look both ways for his patronage. However, there is nothing equivocal about the fin de siécle knight of the ash-can. The ancient jest of the cold steam-pipe and the monkey- wrench is a sardonic reality of which the luckle: flat-dweller is only too painfully aware. Every one knows that with this light morning exercise he gets up steam (heaven save the mark above him!) for the day’s work. Even the most chari tably disposed among us, hearing of the untimely demise of this demon of the dumbwaiter, can not bring himself to excl eace to his ashes!” when his ears are still ringing with the early morning thunder of furnace-shaking. A French concierge may be a tyrant typical of his tribe, but he is quite innocuous in comparison with the béte noire of the dwellers in flats—the Cellar Vulcan. And even when one has crossed his grimy palm with silver, does he alertly ascend from the nether regions, wrench or hammer in hand, to repair the insidious leak, or to see what may be the matter with “that confounded radiator”? No, he does not. Rather may he be found in disputatious converse with the milkman or the baker's boy. chaffering over his percentage of profit on the delivery of the microscopic roll or the bottle of hydrated lacteal. To him it is a matter of sublime indifference that the rent- Muriel—So Judge Merryman proposed to Alice last night! Ethel—Yes, and he made an awful break. When she asked him for time to consider his proposal, he gave her sixty days. Lieutenant Bug—This barrage ought to clean ‘em up! payer should expect service from one who is so busy that he has no time at all for such trifles as attending to his duties. The landlord may be an ogre who owns the universe in fee simple, but the Janitor is lord paramount of his domain, and thus, although he lives below-stairs, is above such petty considera- tions as the foolish importunities of a mere leascholder. Perhaps, when the Millennium is on the horizon, the luckless wight who is accorded the inestimable privilege of existence “with all modern improvements” may be favored with the service of some light-footed Mercury of the basement who is not light-fingered as well as heavy-headed. But until that nebulous dream becomes a reality we will continue to endure the haughty disdain of this genius of the sub-cellar, the while, with fervent litany, consigning him to that Plutonian shore whence he must have originally crupted. —H.H. Craigie. Girl Friends Patience—No, I shan’t be a soldier’s bride. Khaki doesn’t match my complexion Patrice: ther of your complexions, dear? Celia WHEN people with their dollars Of sharp futility Would tighten like high collars Around the neck of me. L used to journey out by train ‘And tramp good miles of mud To find the world set right again In some spring leaf or bud. But now I need not wander Remotely from my kind, For I should carry yonder But Celia in my mind. And is it sensible, finding a tree Pleasanter than faces When she combines humanit With all the woodland places. —Witter Bynner. { | comicbooks.com