Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1899-09-16

the midmorning hours you may have seen
the king a hundred times he stalked
downtown to nurse his royal snecure. He
is thickset man of fifty, Immediately
groomed from the gloss of his hat to the
gloss of his boots. He has close-cropped.
stee1-gray hair; small, hard, steel-gray
eyes and a square, clean shaved face, so
infleXible in expression 1t might have been
forged from the same metal. His bearing
and walk are infused with equal rigidity,
and his voice resembles the ciang OF
hammer upon a section of armor plate.
He would make an imposing figurehead for
a ffrst-class battle ship.
Every morning the king stalks south
ward. figure erect and eyes front. If he
doesn't know you. he doesn't you: if
he does you may or may not receive
Steely nod. according to his royal mood.
You must bow and scrape. in any case. He
expects and receives 1t all the way down
the street: then the dOork6epe ScrapeS, the
bcotblack scrapes. the elevator boy scrapes.
and the entire court rises up and makes
profound obeisance. The day over, salaams
are repeated, and he stalks northward to
his great, handsome, lonely bachelor apart
ments. and spends his evening-heaVcn
knows how. Certainly not at concerts. He
hated music of every kind. save the harsh
jangle and rear of downtown traffic. He
might have replaced the pipe and bowl of
that other monarch by a drink and a
cigar. the tiddlerS three he would certainly
have StraDgled.
Which brings me to certain morning
when he stalked st.ff1y southwark, with
In his thoughts And he didn't allow any
one to divert his attention from It, either.
The doorkeeper. the bootblack and the ele-
Nat0r boy bowed and Scraped in vain and
the entire court rose up and salaamed to
utter vacancy. He assembled his throne,
pressed button and stared his calendar
out of countenance until the imperial stem
ographer arrived, when he sunk lower in
his seat, thrust his fists deep in his pock-
cts. scowled ferociously at the toe of his
boot and dictated as follows:
Editor of the New York -:
Sir: While heartily applauding the COM
plants published in your columns from
time to time against petty nuisances, l re-
greet that the most abominabe outrage
practtced upon New Workers. has so far
escaped cenSure. | allude to the blackmail-
ing practices of those Italian vagabonds
who, until the necessary bride is extorted.
grind out their ear-Splitting discordS be-
meath their victims windows. l am not
an invalid or a crank. on the contrary,
normal and good-tempered. (Here the i'm
perial stenographer felt his eye turned on
her and moved not a muScie.) But, sir.
could the inventor of the piano organ be
found today. / should unhestatingly say
strange him.; and as for these mendicants
and their equally criminal supporters.
nothing short of slow torture would do
them justice / was racked all last even
Ing by one of these hideous instruments,
and the neighborhood of my office is posi-
lively haunted by a certain rascally Italian
biackmailer. who renders work absolutely
impossible by the repetition of maudlin
ballads. ] allude especially to the present
epidemic of" But here was was inter-
rupted
Swe-e-et Rosie OGra-a-ady
My dear little Rose,
The blackmailer had arrived. A lord-in-
waiting rushed to the window. The king
gTasped a paper weight and stood by. The
imperial stenographer shuddered The
wizened little Italian below melted into a
Joyous smile, poor. deluded wretch, and
waved his hand playfully.
She-e-es my steady la-a-ady,
Most every one
What most every one did was never di-
vulged- The blackmailer trundled his organ
on, still wearing the joyous smile Tha
lord-in-waiting was dispatched to the street
with orders to have him arrested Ii he con-
tinued within earshot. The imperial stem
ographer resumed her pencil with trem-
bling fingers. while his majesty stalking
up and down, continued at white heat He
closed with this powerful peroration:
"Why are these gross violations of public
order permitted by the authorities? Ger
tainly daily life contains enough unavoid
able nuisances without our fostering this
one, which is a disturbance to all. a pleas
ure to none and. l repeat virtually petty
Matchmaking scheme. Truly We are a long
suffering people,"
A few hours later the king. who possess
"a considerable interests on the East river
boarded a car and jolted across town. That
ID, the other passengers jolted; he retained
his adamantine rigidity. But fate decreec
that horse should drop sunstruck across
The track, a block enSued. and the roya
9orse car was stalled quite a distance from
Ehe river. The king. who regarded any OBJ
/ Dsfuotion to his imperial progress as per