Life — October 26, 1911 — page 22: what you’re looking at

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

A MODERN WILD GOOSE CHASE Letters to the Literati Robert W. Chambers HAMBERS, Chambers, Robert W., Won't your conscience ever trou- ble you? Though you make a magnate’s salary Out of yarns like that of Valerie, Out of tales with plots erotical, High-born heroes, rude, despotical, Stagey speeches full of gushiness, Kissy-kissy mushy-mushiness— Though a huge success you're thought to be Are you really what you ought to be? Robert, Robert, come be sensible! Trash from you is indefensible. Life you've seen, and thought a bit of it; Treat of that and make a hit of it! Spurn your Tainted Aristocracy; Give our youngsters clean democracy. You can write so well, in many ways, Folks are bound to read you anyways. Drop this namby-pamby quackery ; Shake yourself and be a Thackeray ! Arthur Guiterman. Something Had to Be Done HE busting of the trusts affects so much the value of securities in which decent and harmless people have put their honest money that a good many of them are inclined to wail about it rather sadly. Good friends, cheer up! We are sorry for you. Don’t be too much scared, for that is more dangerous than the Sherman act. If your stock investments are any way decent they won't melt all away. Harden your hearts and hang on. The enforcement of the Sherman act is disturbing and perplexing. Maybe it is hard on you just now. Maybe it will cost you IRE something, though less, we believe, than you fear. No doubt it will do imperfect justice, but have patience and have courage. Think of the To- bacco Trust, a trust (to quote the World) “ which even in 1900 had only $25,000,000 of capital, and was in eight years expanded into one of $315,- (000,000,”” If you doubt that something had to be done, get Commissioner Smith’s re- port and read up on the Tobacco Trust, its enormous rapacity, its tyrannies, its ruthlessness, its unconscionable dilu- tion of its securities, the ravenous per- sistence of its resolve to get everything there was in the tobacco business and divide the bulk of the spoil among its little inside group of cormorants. Something had to be done. That it should be done exactly right was too much to hope. That the guilty should suffer and the innocent escape is con- trary to human experience. That what is being done will be effectual is de- batable. But something had to be done. There had been too much abom- inable wrong-doing to sit down under. Somehow, by regulation or reorganiz- ation or prevention, or perhaps by some destruction, big business is going to be put on a more just and tolerable basis, and we have got to sit tight and have patience and not yell too much and see the job through. Do College Students Drink ? HOSE charges of intemperance against college students, lodged by Mr. Crane of Chicago, caused no little stir, but the denials were so prompt and emphatic that we may al- ready consider the incident closed. Nevertheless, in order to make assur- ance doubly sure, we have secured a few interviews on the subject from authoritative sources. “Tt is outrageou said a well- known Harvard Freshman. “ Drink is absolutely unknown at Harvard, There may be an occasional student who re- ceives a little unfermented grape juice from home, but even this is rare and is discountenanced, not only by the faculty, but by the student body as well.” A Sophomore at Yale who is noted for his extreme caution was equally emphatic as to the situation in New Haven. He said: “I will admit that there was a time at Yale when we sang drinking songs, such as ‘Give Us a Drink, Bartender,’ but it was only in fun, and no bartender ever paid the slightest attention to it. There is no case recorded where a Yale student, either drunk or sober, ever entered a saloon, and I doubt if many of them, linguists though they be, know the meaning of the word stein.” One of the oldest living undergrad- uates at Princeton was seen and in- duced to talk for publication. “ Per- fect nonsense,” he said in disgust. “I cannot believe that Mr. Crane was in earnest. I will not say there is no drinking at all at Princeton, but the better class of students do not indulge. Of course, it is well known by so- ciologists that poor people are intem- perate. Princeton is probably no ex ception, and I have heard that tho: students who have to work their way are drunk most of the time. The rich students, however, are abstemious. In- deed, I may say they are excessively abstemious.” 0. J. Put Them in Who’s Who! GIPRERE. should be some compensa- tion for the publicity that is thrust upon gentlemen, heretofore un- known to fame, who are indicted un- der the Sherman law. The new edi- tion of “Who's Who in America” should include the names of these per- sons, or the chief of them, and cer- tainly the names of all the martyrs who are sent to jail. The purpose of sending them to jail is not to remove them from society, but to illustrate the law, and the illustrations will be the more valuable if they are preserved, and accessible, in books of reference. AN ASTER WEDDING comicbooks.com