Life — August 18, 1921 — page 4: what you’re looking at

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

How It Really Happened T was before the days of pocket-hand- kerchiefs; it was be- fore the days of fig- leaves too, or, more correctly speaking, it was the very day that fig-leaves came into fashion. As Eve hurried through the shrubbery, she snatched one from - an overhanging bough and wiped her eyes. Everything had gone wrong since daybreak. To begin with, Adam had criti- cized the way she had fixed her hair. She had wanted to look especially nice, for Gabriel was coming down to help plan the Govern- ment of Eden, so she had gathered up her long flowing tresses and bound them in a shining gold coronet round her head. Adam had frowned and said the ar- rangement was most immodest. She hadn’t the least idea what the word meant, except that it was something un- pleasant. Adam was always puzzling By ELIZABETH LE FEVRE her with words she couldn’t understand. And then there had been the usual bickering breakfast. Adam had refused even to taste the prickly pears, and wanted to know if she would never learn not to offer him over-ripe fruit, and ended with a touching eulogy to the toothsome cocoanuts his mother used to serve. Eve wished she had reminded him that gather- ing cocoanuts was his mother’s chief accomplishment! And then, to cap the climax, he had asked her to run along out of the way and gather flowers, while he and Gabriel planned the Government. She was tired of gathering flowers; she would much rather have helped with the Government. Blinded with tears, she didn’t notice where she was until she was startled by a voice just above her. Looking up, she spied the serpent festooned among the branches of the Forbidden Tree. “Beautiful Angel, do not weep,” whis- pered the voice. “I’m not an angel.” “Have your own way, beautiful child,” replied the voice caressingly. “I’m not a beautiful child, I am a beautiful woman,” pouted Eve. “And I am tired to death of being treated like a Great Historic Moments child. But tell me,” she added, you take me for an angel?” “It was your more than earthly beauty,” cooed the voice. “That, and the halo-like arrangement of your hair.” “Really, do you like it? Do jou like my hair?” murmured Eve, radiant. “Tt is absolutely adorable.” “Then Adam doesn’t know thing?” ventured Eve. “Hardly.” “But I’d do anything to be as as he.” “Why don’t you, then?” “What could I do?” gasped Ev. “Here, eat this,” and an apple dangled temptingly within her reach. “Adam says I mustn’t,” she faltered. “Oh, Adam says, and Adam says,” hissed the serpent. “How do you think Adam gets all his wisdom? Whiy, he comes here to the Tree of Knowledge every morning, when you think he’: feed- ing the animals, and fairly gorges him- self with apples. That’s why he has no appetite for your delicious breakfasts.” “I never heard of such a thing,” said the first lady of the land as she snatched the apple and buried her pearly teeth in the delicious pulp. “why did f every- wise Solomon returns after a brief absence bringing a few knickknacks for the wives and kiddies comicbooks.com