The Press., 1897-09-02
JOSHED ALL NATIONS.
THE Ex-KINe OF THE FAkIRS TELLS
 HOW TO MAKE A LIVING.

Work In Thirty Years-How He Got His Riokname-Corn salve For Russians and Perfumed Beans For Frenohmen.
 Tick Lowndes, the king of the fakirs, having become rich, left of trav- cling on his f1ftieth birthday, married a young wife and settled down in Phila- delphia, 'because was born there, " he says in explanation of this strange | thing, "and I believe a man ought to give the town he was born in a show. |" For nearly 8O years Lowndes, oircum- navigating the globe II times, beamed upon the worlds population through his Moses P. Handy whiskers, and, in his own words, "joshed lem all, white, black, red, brown and yellow" into providing for his luxurious existence and for his eventual wealth. He got his nickname of Tick from the solid gold watches he used to sell to countrymen for the nominal sum of two bits.
 Maybe you think they won't go, " he would bawl, holding up one of his watches when purchasers were back ward. ''That's where you re way off. Listen to this one tick. " And he would initiate the ticking of watch with his mouth so that the sound could be easily heard by those on the outer limits of | the crowd around his torch illuminated carriage, Success and seniority gave him the title king of the fakirs, by which be was known until his retire ment
 II often bear no account chaps talk ing nbont how hard it is to get along In this world" said Lowndes when be was here. "They mako me weary. The world is casy-easy' y''-snapping his fingers us if tho subject was too silly to talk about When I was a small boy, playing marbles and shinny and peg top, I looked about me and saw oil hands breaking their necks trying to earn a living--strugRlinR, sweating, worrying working like the devil, every one of 'em.
 Ut was positively painful for noe to watch 'em, although was only in knee brooches. l made up my mind right then that had n heap too big a capaci- ty for fun to wear myself out working. | and determined to make the world my l oyster. Well, I've been nibbling on the | oyster ever since, and the only work l you could call work that 1 ever did was four days of coal heaving down in the stokeholo of Japanese steamer on which 1 was stowawGy. How's that for a rCcOrd-only four days work in | 30 ycarsi Don't look it?''
 Tick did look 1t. He was perambu- latinR jeWclCr's shop. Diamonds gilt tered all over him-not the sort of dia- monds ho used to put into his Pandora envelopes. It was acknowledged that he | looked prosperous all right.
 Now you'll be astOnished, but the worst jays I ever struck anywhere i'll the world are the Russians I think sold about lvo tons of axle grease corn | salve fer ruble an ounce box on one | trip through southern Russia. All the men in Russia have corna They all wear heavy Cowhide boots - the ordinary folks, mean-which suppose accounts for 1t felt almost ashamed the way | those Russian folks fell over each other to buy my ordinary axle grease of com merce for their corns, and the worst of it was that in the larger towns, where I staid for three or four days, the yape that had bought the stuff on the first day of my arrival came to me before left and told me gratefully that the grease bad entirely cured their corns Why, was regarded as a public bene- factor throughout the whole Russian | empire
 "I found the French pretty easy ones, too, especially in the smaller towns. The first time hit France was sell ing West Indian perfumed beans. They were the ordinary American beans that they don't know how to cook in Bos- I IoSIoitn oI1 fhiS kalk nq PnSfnr, 10 the town of beans. I dyed the beans blue and soaked 'cm over night in CO., | logne- 1 used a Mexican vaQuCro's make up on this trip and sold the beans a dozen for a franc, with a long spell bind about the perfume lasting for 1 1000 years aHd so on. It was like finding money, this bean fake ill France.
 "All of the South Americans, from Panama to Patagonia, are pretty easy to | gold brick. All over South America I sold thousands of gallons of whitening tonic to make the half breeds white. 1 made 1t of nights as went along out of any old thing that wasn't harmful dandelion roots, wild cherry bark and such stuff. The governments got after me finally for 1t, though, and that s the reason the half breeds of South America are still reddish in color. | Their governments wouldn't let 'em buy enough of my whitening stuff, you see
 "Tbe Mexicans'l buy anything
 You may not believe it, but sold thou sands of dollars worth of common bar soap for removing grease spots on one trip down there, notwithstanding the fact that the duds worn by the people who bought the soap were as much on the G string order as the law of the land would permit sold lem safety razors that cost me @ quarter each wholesale for $S, which was about as low down as ever l played it, as any man who ever used a safety razor will admit ''I would have made a million out of the natives of the Fiji islands if the l jealous white residents down there had not chOked me off. As 1t was, cleaned up good bit of money on the scheme. traded off blue spectacles with the Fi- jis for cochineaL Cochineal at that time was about worth its weight in silver. The Fijis went crazy over my stock of goggles, and had several of the island CTS gathering cochineal for mo until the consuls hunted me out
 'I was cooking up scheme to sell the Kaff1rs some stuff to straighten their kinky wool and make 1t look like the white mans hair, but the white people down there wouldn't stand it, although there was millions in it '-Washington | Cor. New York Sun
 Thirty-two Times For Peace. Out of 60 arbitration treaties among the nations of the world since 1915 the United States has borne a part in 82, far more than any other nation. .-Bos-