Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-07-02
THE STAR ABOARD SHIP

| IT never-pick DIP . copy of The Evening
Star when I'm bore IN Washington or any
| where else In the world that Tn not re-
minded Of q shipmate-we were middiss to-
| gether-who used to devote whole days to
reading arnfuls Of Stars that would reach
| him In bunchesI on cruises" said an OIL
| Ger Of the navy now on departmental duty.
He was Washington boy, and he was
| born and raised with The Star, so to speak.
When he went a-cruising on the deep sea
| The Star was sent after him every day
from Washingt3n, always in care Of the
| navy pay office of his station, and thence
forwarded to whatever ship to which he
| happened to be attached.
Thus, when he was cruising In foreign
waters the bundles Of Stars used to ac-
!cumulate Until they made big pile be-
| fore he ever got hold Of them. When. In
foreign port. the mail came aboard, he
of course read and re-read his letters from
home-not, to mention the accumulation of
letters from the girf-hrst, and then he
carry his pile Of Star papers below to
| his room and proceed to go at 'em in
systematic way.
First, he'd peel the covers of Of them
and pile them up on his bunk every which
way. Then he'd straighten them out to
their full size, and proceed to arrange
them In order according to their dates OF
publication. with the earliest dated paper
on top Of the pile. and SO on down to the
bottom. the bottom paper being the lat
est of the bunch to be forwarded him from
the navy pay Office.
After he'd got the papers all straight
ened out on his bunk he'd pull off his
blouse, dare the wardroom boy to disturb
him ON peril Of his life. and proceed to
eat The Star papers up one by one. He d
never leave of. even for mess, while ne
was thus engaged. Wild horses couldn't
have dragged him ashore with the rest Of
the middies white he had bunch Of the
IN MAIN
Ing been born and reared IN Washington.
and having known everybody in Wash
ington, as the saying is, while he was
growing up. he extracted all kinds OF the
keenest pleasure in prowling through the
local pages and finding out what was do
ing back home. It's the same with naval
officers from every old place. You'd be
amazed to observe the avidity with which
officers Of the navy fairly masticate their
home papers from the littleSt imaginable
places, when they're away Off IN the
farthest corners of the world, out OF that
same desire to keep track of what the
friends and companions of their home
days are I'D to-
1T would take this Washington ship
mate of mine hours to wade through his
stack of Stars when we were on the China
station. for the mails from San Francisco
were occasionally few and far between,
and sometimes he'd have as many as TWEEN
ty Of the papers to assimilate in rota-
ton. After he'd finish reading the pile.
he'd tuck them under his arm and go up
to the mess: room, push his cap over his
forehead In tough sort of way. walk
with shamble and sing out. Stah yeah
with a perfect imita ton of the newSboyS
call of the paper here in Washington
Most of the officers were familiar with
the sound from having been on Washing
ton duty. and the youngster always got
laugh out of his impersonation of the
Washington newsie.
We'll. our ship got into Hong Kong from
Yokohama one forenoon, and when the
mail orderly got back from his first shore
trip he brought my MILDLY mate eighteen
accumulated Star papers. We both went
below to read our mail, for our cabins ad-
joined After getting through his letters
he went through his usual performance Of
opening up and arranging the Stars, and
sat down In his cabin with some of my
own home papers while he went at the job
of getting the Washington news
Funny thing he said to me, looking up
after reading for long time, to see my
good old mother read The Star. First thing
she turns to always is the death column
She was born in Georgetown, you know,
away back yonder when Washington was q
little bit of a place, and if there's anybody
Of the old crowd in the District of Column
bia that she doesn't know. or know some
thing about, I never heard of that any
body. Wei, the dear old lady always finds
in The Stars death column the name Of
somebody just deceased that opens the
f1oodgates of her memory She invariably
finds it astonishing that that deceased per-
SON SIlouiu lilly Z. pdSSeu away at SuSi th
early age, although when you look at the
notice you'll observe that the deceased per-
son is somewhere around sixty or seventy,
as like as not. If it's q lady my mother
always knows her by her maiden name.
and il it's a man she remembers when he
was a smudge-faced boy running around
the old Georgetown streets and getting
into mischief. The Stars announcements
of deaths and marriages and births GER
tainly evoke a lot of "reminiscences from
my little old mother
"After thus rafting on for brief inter-
mission the boy went ahead to finish the
remaining stack of Stars. whistling plain
lively as he picked them up one by one and
ran over the pages. He came to the last
paper on the pile on his bunk. the eigh-
teenth, still keeping up that muted sort of
a whistle, and turned the pages over rather
hurriedIy, for 1T was close upon the hour
for mess call.
Suddenly while buried in a paper of my
own, 1 noticed that he quit his whistling
in the midst of rollicking passage, and
something in the sudden silence caused me
to look up. The last of the Star papers
was lust slipping from his nerveless grasp
to the floor. He was tilted back in his
chair and his face had gone ashy and he
was gazing straight ahead with an acute
pain in his eyes.
Look here, old man, what's up? 1 ask
ed him, jumping up IN alarm and going
over to him.
He didn't make any reply but motioned
to the last of the Star papers that had
slipped to the floor beside him.
Il picked it up, and with a sort of in
stinctive knowledge of what allied him I
cast my eye down the death column.
The notice of his mothers death appear
cd in that column"