Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-01-02

demands of the most ssortby and eminent
citizens of the town that these hotels be
forced by the fire authorities to comply
with the law in affording facilities for the
escape of guests In case of fire.
In many cases. on account of the absence
of alleys in New York, the hotel proprietors
were ordered to erect fire escapes at the
front and sides of their hosteiries, despite
the faced protests of the proprietors that
such fire escapes would ''disfigure' the APP
pearance of their caravansaries. Not one
out OF ten of the hotel proprietors showed
the least inclination to obey the mandate
of the fire authorities as to the erection Of
the outside fire escapes, and when the exc
element following the Windsor Hotel fire
died out the fire authorities immeda tely
began to show their former strange COM
piaisSnce in blinking at the hotel mems
fragrant disobedience of the law.
The cutlery against wooden piers was long
and fierce after the tremendous pier fire
over in Hoboken a few years ago, for at
one stage of that fire the flames threatened
TO be carried by the high wind across the
North river to New York. The demand for
steel piers in place of the wooden ones last
ed, htfully, for all of two weeks in the
newspapers The fact was pointed out that
New York had on several occasions been
menaced by wooden pier fires occurring
curing the prevalence OF high winds
New York Is narrow stretch of land.
ana. IN general. 1t is perhaps the most COM
bustlole city In America. that the wood
en- dock fires have frequently jeopardized
the town. Millions of dollars worth of adj
Joining property was destroyed by the New
York Central pier and elevator fire about
nfteen years ago. But they are displacing
the decayed wooden piers with more wood
en- ones along the water front OF New York
today, despite the public demand that steel
piers be substituted for oil worn-out wc,d-
en- piers. The newspapers are not say,ng
anything about it. either. but they will get
enormously busy on the subject again when
the next colossal pier fire breaks out and
threatens the town
Murphy Stickler on Observances.
1t is comforting to know that one of the
most strongly marked hobbies of Mr. Chas
murphy, who from today becomes the vir-
tuai ruler of New York as long as his Or
ganization remains In power is to strictly
ana literally enforce the letter and spirit
OF an the fire ordinances 1t is not
likely That any theatrical manager will ad-
dress any Say, you,'' communica tons TO
the man put at the head of the fire depart-
ment by the stubborn, thin-lipped and de-
termined Murphy
1t is said that the leader of Tammany
Hall derived his ideas as to the proper en-
1orcement of the fire. ordinances a good
many years ago, when he saw the Hotel
Royal, at the corner of 10th street and 9Th
avenue, burn up its scores of helpless
guests That hotel was absolutely deficient
II any means whatever of escape from fire
Tor its guests, owing to the drag which
its proprietor is said to have exercised with
the then head of the Tammany organize
ton.
Murphy. in his capacity as a mere leader
OF one Tammany district, then took I'D the
matter OF the enforcement of the fire ordi-
nances and was promptly sat down upon
for his pains and interest Now he has the
situation in his own hands. and the Chicago
horror will doubtless Murphy to
hurry in the issuance of those orders which,
it is said, he has had in preparation for
some time. to the proprietors of places of
call and entertainment to rig their eStab-
lishments with all modern means looking
to the safety of their patrons from fires
and fire panics.
In the meantime arson is becoming one
of the most ordinary, everyday crimes of
New York. and nearly every week. if not
oftener, an attempt is made to set some
ancient and rattletrap tenement in flames
presumably for the obtaining of the insur-
ance. That 18th avenue tenement house fire
a month or ago, in which many humble
folk lost their lives. has already been
shown to have been of undoubted incen-
diary origin.
The town is infested too, with pyro-
maniacs. sufferers from a so-called nervous
aff1ictioD who enjoy the sights and sounds
attending a great fire. Oil-Soaked waste is
frequently dropped into the letter boxes of
fiat buildings in the finer residential dis
trfctS, and it has come to pass that most of
the fiat buildings have to have watchmen as
well as japitors, simply to guard against
the diseased deViltry of the new brood Of
Dyromaniacs
There are some persons of considerable
standing and common sense over here who
take so little stock in the nervous disease"
theory of the medical men to the pyro-
maniacs that they are advocating that
son, whether it be successful or not, be
made capital crime 1t is not, in fact, I'M
likely that arson will at least be made. in
time. crime calling for life Imprisonment.
Whether they're pyromaniacs or not. as de-
scribed by the specialists in nervous dis
eases the fellows who deliberately attempt
to burn down buildings. holding scores and
hundreds of sleeping people. merely for the
fun of seeing the. fames," do not appear
to the reasonable man to have much license
to be running around loose.
Physical Culture Show a Failure.
The so-called physical culture ex-
hibition at the Garden is dismal sort of an
affair, composed mostly of muscle-bound
young men visibly proud of the insight
ly knobs on their persons and of gnarled
and disproportionately developed young
women with little or no facial or other
womanly loneliness. gyrating and comfort
ing on pedestals, in something that looks
a good deal like union underwear.
A side issue issue is alleged walking
match between a lot of seedy and aged
men who are supposed to fast totally
while they jogging around the track
The whole affair is permeated by spirit
of advertisement of those singular phys
ical culture systems. so tremendously eX-
plotted IN the back pages or magazines
whereby you become a Hercules while
you wait exercise four minutes in
Hour room each morning and become a
winning athlete" gain superb
symmetry and grace by going through
these motions six times before breakfast"
At the wind-up of the show some of the
knobby and knotty women punch bags, and
others of them wreStle on mat. No
woman. needless to say, looks pretty or
enticing on wrestling mat. AS they enter
the Garden the folks visiting the show
handed ballots. which they are supposed 10
use in voting for the "handsomeSt formed
lady in the exhibition"
1t is observed that few of the ballots
really cast. The patrons of the show
mostly men, and it is popularity of the
modern male that he hasn't any very ex-
allied idea of the pulchritude of any woman
who works up a prize fighters biceps by
means of weight-pullng machines and
other similar devices
French Balls Thing Of the Past.
Calamitous visitations continue to de-
scend upon this town. Now 1t is announced
that the French ball is thing OF the past.
Anyhow, they re not going to give a French
ball this year-the wine agents." that is
hold