Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1903-12-12
WHEN GREEK MET GREEK

tumn OF 1865, SdlQ y w f6fHuStoh CofEC-
spondent who is now Settled man. but
who, during his days of rowing, was every
thing but barber and policeman. Il
found that thriving Arizona town whole
lot more prosperous than I was. 1 had
gone down there from San Francisco with
the vague, not to say the wistful, idea
and hope that maybe I'd run into some
benevolent angel who'd start me news
paper in Tucson and permit me to earn
national fame for it and myself by run
ming it according to my own ideas-the an
gel of course. paying the freight. pocket
ing losses and equally sharing dividends,
If any.
But. somehow or another angels APP
peared to be quite scarce in Tucson just
then, although all hands appeared to be
making plenty of money besides good
living. Worse than the scarcity of angels
was the fact that the STATS of the Tucson
newspapers were clustered to the bumper
point-each of them employing no less than
two men--and, sadly enough, all of these
staff members exhibited a distinct and de-
termined inclination to hang on to their
jobs Unavailingiy I essayed to work
couple Of them up to the point of shooting
up the town or trying to rope the night
marshal or something of that sort that
would cause one or both Of them to be
fired from their Jobs, thus causing one or
more newspaper vacancies; but they tum-
bled to my somewhat maladroit plan, and
stubbornly declined to permit the mescal
to carry them along to the riOtous point.
$50 that. in point Of fact, after I'd been
in Tucson for about two weeks. with moth
ing doing, 1 began to reflect that II some
thing didn't happen pretty soon I'd find
myself begged.
I'm a moment of gloom I narrated my
tale of woe to the landlord of my hotel.
with whom l happened to be all square,
yards. for the reason that I'd had the fore
sight and the precedence to pay my board
bill two weeks in advance upon arriving
in the town.
You needn't be surprised any, I told
the good natured landlord. If I stick your
night clerk up one of these nights and take
to the chaparral with whatever small
change room money he happens to have in
the till. I'm all in, and don't see anybody
in Tucson making feather beds from the
moultings of the angels around here. How
about a bell boys billet. If you expect me
to remain honest, or berth as head-boots
of your inn?
TT was at this stage of it that that
whole-souled innkeeper of Tucson got busy
In forming scheme for my behest and in
my behalf.
Never done no lecturin', did you, ON
brey?' he asked me.
Seeing that he was taking such an in
terest in me, I thought L might as we'll be-
on the level with him, and told him. cam
didly, that 1 hadn't ever been engaged in
the lecture field.
"'Well, that amt sayin' that you couldn't
spin EN- talk, suppOsin' the chanst swung
your way said the landlord. Now, I've
got tucked away in the cellar a lot o. Ian
tern slides-picters o. Greece ancient and
modern, is what they're labeled-that was
left here couple o. year ago by a lee
turin snoozer that never got sober enough
the hull time he was in and around Tucson
to Onreel his talk, although he advertised
his lecture four or five times, and never
pulled it off. He was plum loco from booze
all the time he was here, and he disap-
p'lnted the population so often. after prom
1sin' to deliver his lecture. that, the last
crit
tgether and runs the Iecturin' booze-fght-
er out O. town, and he never streaks back
no more. Consequent. I'm the heir and as
sign forever of these yere slides o. his'n
that portray all what is about ancient and
modern Greece. Now. there's your tip om-
brey, and you kin work the rest of it out
Yourself You're welcome to use them
slides if you care to, and I'll guarantee
that you'll draw a houseful with 'em and
that the boys'I behave-they'u have to- be-
cause they'll be ladies present-TH see to it
that everybody in Tucson what's Injured
to lectures'H be on hand.
Il guess perhaps there wasn't mamma In
that kindly suggestion! I thanked the land
lord, and he had-the bunch of slides brought
up from the cellar and busted Off. He not
only had the slides, but he had the recrea nt
apd lost-out lecturers magic lantern and
all the rest of the gear, all ready to be set
up and put together for the lecture. look
ed the slides over and found that they were
a genuine fine lot Of views.
II got a property man from the Tucson
op'rey house who knew all about fixing I'D
magic lantern gear to assemble the STUFF
and try 1t out in the hotel dining room after
the supper had been cleared away, and 1t all
worked like charm. Then, with the land
lord backing me UP, I rented the op,rey
house for the following Thursday evening
it was then Monday-and inserted tick ad
In both of the newspapers to the general eff
feet that Romoopolus Hadrianus Euripides |
the famous traveller and professor OF the
University Of Athens, would deliver his
noted lecture on Ancient and Modern Greece |
on the following Thursday evening at the
op'rey house, with the finest set of views IL I
Illustrative of his subject that had ever been
got together. The landlord who was con-
Of a citizen OF Tucson. got to work |
plugging for me, and when the tickets were |
put on sale at the drug store they went like |
the proverbial hot cakes The lantern was |
set up and the slides were thrown on the !
screen In q rotation rehearsal, and on |
Thursday morning 1t occurred to me that it |
wouldn't be such bad idea for me to begin /,
to think up something to say to go with the |
pictures.
II had never been any nearer to Greece
than Coney Island, or Sandy Hook, at the |
outside. but I wasn't bothered much by that
I didn't stand in much fear |
that the Tucsonites would be sticklers for |
the exact figures as to Ancient and Modern |
Greece
'.And. as a matter of fact, they weren't. !
The lecture I gave 'em was all right. and !
1t went through with rush. I spread 1t |
OF pretty thick about Horatius at the |
bridge, and let them have plenty Of The |
isles of Greece. the isles of Greece. where /
burning Sappho loved and sung'-in fact, I /
think I handed them that quotation no less |
than eighteen different times during the /
lee ture. just to fill in. Sappno was always |
a great favorite Of mine. anyhow. men
toned, too quite a number Of times, how
the sea looked on Marathon and Marathon |
looked on the sea. and lusged in Espasia
and her friend Pericles. and did the best I |
knew how to whitewash their little uncon-
l devoted few moments
to Diogenes, as well as to Socrates, and /
kind O. puzzled them and aroused their ad-
miration by dwelling upon the peripatetic
school Of philosophy-they didn't know I
what the dickens was talking about and I
when lecturer gets an audience into that |
state of mind their admiration for him in
81 eases with every tick Of the chronometer. /
Then l brought the thing along to the sack
Ing of Athens and the placing Of the Ro-
man yoke upon the Greeks and when the |
slides began to exhibit modern Greece I J.
became poeticaI and hid my dense igno-
rance OF everything appertaining to modern +
Greece by rhapsodizing about the mountain
scenery and the Ionian fslets and the wave
let's of the Aegean sea, and all that sort Of I
away with 1t, too, 20 sue
that had 'em on their feet and |
at the end Of the lecture
II counted up the gate receipts after they
went, and found that there was $3.50 left
for me- after having all exneusaa T want