St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1886-05-30
CURIOUS HELPS TO MEMORY.
Tom Prendergast Puts His Knife in
his Vest Pocket.
Other Strange Devices to Call to Mind
Desired Thought.

Wnen the Sidewalks were crowded with
hurryng pedestrians. I ran across Tom
Prendergast, the lightning city clerk,
standing in the middle of Fifth street has
tily making pencil memorandum on a
diminutiVe vest pocket tablet His position
was very like what would have been the
result of shooting an instantaneous camera
at him while on the full gallop. One foot
was forward with the knee slightly bent
and his weight rested ON the toe of his
other foot. His overcoat tail was
still flying behind him. for he did not
stop long enough to let it come to a
perpendicular. His chin was twisted to
one side to avoid smuggling his mustaehe with
the fire on his cigar-stub. The whole
poise was characteristic of Tom Prender-
CAST, who never makes needless motion
when adopting ordinances and resolutions
in the council chamber with the aldermen
sitting carelessly in their seats enjoying
Bob Smiths cigars. He was accosted with:
You'd make good newspaper reporter"
but paying no attention to the compliment,
like streak of electricity he was again
in motion as he hurled back over his
shoulder. 81 was just making memoir
andum, [ put my knife in my pocket and
then thought | would jot it down besides
and he was gone while l had just caught
glimpse of his pocket knife coming out
of his vest pocket and dropping hurriedly
back again, the action intended as an illus
tration to his remark. The situation was
then clear. Something had flashed across
Toms brain which he wanted to think of
again. and according to his custom he had
removed his pocket-knife from its accuS-
toned place i'll his trousers and deposited
it in his vest pocket where he would after
wards unexpectedly run across it and
habitually, recall the reason why he put
it there. This time the matter was un-
| usually important and he resorted to the
| memorandum as a sure source of striking
the right thought after the knife had told
him something was in the wind.
~
| 1t is curious to observe some of the
| schemes resorted to by different people as
| helps to memory. Tying string around
the finger is frequent both with men and
women, more particularly so with the lat
ter, because the lack of the masculine
prerogative of many pockets prevents the
| change from one pocket to another of any
article usually carried. / know young
wife whose husband is very observing as
well as particular. She is not at all super
| stitious, and when, during his absence in
business hours, she thinks of some
thing she wants to tell him at night
she changes her wedding ring to some
other hnger. He won't be in the house
long before he notices the change-she
knew he woodland she is reminded of
the idea she has treasured up for him.
Whether the wedding ring device will
always accomplish this purpose cannot well
be settled now.
A little the worst case of this kind that I
know of is bookkeeper in a down town
wholesale establishment who stands all
day long at high desk. He has never
been known to sit down, even on a high
| stool, in business hours, and prides himself
| on the fact. He is very forgetful of
| little things, having no connection with his
| business, and has received some severe
Caudle lectures for forgetting to mail his
wife's letters and similar unimportant and
trifing things. One afternoon friend
| dropped in on him with all invitation to
a little informal card party Of ladies
and gentlemen on the next even
ing, and he was, of course, to
knew he would forget the message unless
he adopted some extraordinary means of
remembering it, and, moreover, it must be
delivered that night. So he puzzled over
| the problem few minutes when an idea
struck him. Selecting one of the long
pins lying on his desk for pinning papers
together. he smiled satisfactorily as he de-
| liberately bent it in the form familiar to all
school boys, and then dropped it carefully
into the bottom of his hip pocket. In five
minutes he had forgotten all about it. He
was detained later than usual at the Office
that night, and hurried home to find his
evening meal waiting for him and he sat
down-did he? No; but he set out to when
he instantly recalled the message of his
wife. But he wont try the same expedient
again for fear Of spinal meningitis.