The Birmingham age-herald., 1903-07-09
COMMENTS ON MEN AND
 MATTERS OF THE WORLD

per men were also comfortably fixed" one person receiving a nice little income of sSoOO a year. II is hard for American [ people to realize that leading papers can be guilty of such conduct, but 1t is pointed out that in Germany the free dom of the press is not so great as in America. and this may have great deal to do withsits downfall.
 White Eagle, the saged chief of the Ponca Indians, has resigned the leader ship of his race in favor of his son, Horse Chief Eagle White Eagle is seventy five years old. ard has been chief of his tribe for twenty-five years. He was engaged in several memorable struggles in the early days against the white peo- pie and talks interestingly of his en- counters with Custer, Miles and other heroes of the warfare on the western plains. The veteran chieftain has long ago resigned himself to the inevitable, however. and has accepted the white man as his conqueror and superior. However, he clings with pathetic fidelity to the religious beliefs and tribal customs of his fathers.
 A new source of revenue for the sadly depleted treasury of the servian king dom has been created by King Peter. which promises to be extremely valu- able. He has issued a decree forbidding the use of postage stamps bearing the head of the late Alexander and providing for a set of provisional stamps which will be used until stamps bearing his own portrait can be printed. This new Issue has created much interest among phila- telists over all the world, and the post office at Belgrade has been overwhelmed with orders from the collectors. The sales have already become very great. and fully 90 per cent of those issued have been sold to stamp collectors.
 In some recent trials the American sail ors made a remarkable record In firing at targets with long distance guns. Their success is said to be largely due to an inevention of Capt Scott, a member of the British navy, called "dotter." This is a mechanical contrivance by which a small paper target drawn to a scale, is caused to move before the muzzle of gun with a combined vertical and hori- zontal motion. This is to train the gum ner to aim while the ship is moving. The gunner endeavors to keep the cross wires of his telescope on the target when aiming his gun. When perfect aim is ob- tained an electric current causes pen ell to make a dot on the target which rep resents real target at the distance of 1000 yards. By this means the swaying motion of the ship is taken into the calcu- lations.
 It is stated that Cyrano de Bergerac comes near to being the most successful play ever written, the immortal Shakes peare not excepted. Rostand's great mas terpiece has had CTS representations in Paris alone and the total receipts were 4,1s0O00 francs, or an average of 5,926 francs for each performance. In Amer ican money this represents $1.14S for every performance.
 Although the play was very success full in this country 1t did not create what could be styled furor Richard Mans field played the part of the hero very acceptably but his own reputation had much to do with the large houses that greeted him on his tour of the continent. Perhaps Americans are not so emotional and are not effected to such a degree by sentiment as the French. Cyrano de Bergerac Is strictly Frenchman's play, in style plot and theme, therefore 1t Is not surprising that it's greatest popularity was achieved in the city of Paris.