The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-12-02

H HERE is a ludicrous aspect to k0 President Roosevelt's denial that
 his children cruelty treated a turkey which was sent to grace the Pres ident's Thanksgiving board by MT. Vose of Rhode Island, gentleman who seems to be the official donator of turkeys to the President The incident and the charge are equally insignificant. Perhaps Mir. Roosevelt was unduly wrought up over the matter and perhaps he felt that the accusation was too unjust to be overlooked, but what if the Roosevelt children did chase a turkey around in that hilarious abandonment so charac- teristic of the little dears when they are up to mischief? Hundreds, yes thous- ands, of healthy American children have done the same thing, but in view of the fact that 1t was the Roosevelt children and not the O'Flaherty urchins news paper correspondents felt justified in making lots of noise about the affair and converting the young Roosevelts into
 bloodthirsty savages. However. this in cident merely typihes the simplicity and democracy of American life. What old world potentate with half the power of MT. Roosevelt would make a public de- nial of a story that his children had pulled the tall feathers out of a turkey?
 It appears that Melba has also con- tracted the Patti habit of refusing to sing when there Is not enough money forthcoming. Pittsburg no ooubt thinks that 1t knows a thing or two about music and can appreciate as great an artist as Melba but Melba thought dif- ferently and when she saw that the audience which assembled in Pittsburg's Carnegie music hall last Mon day night did not come up to expec- tations she promptly fell i'll and refused to appear. The managers no doubt had bad half hour giving the irate and dis appointed music lovers their money back but Pittsburg did not hear Melba sing.
 There is no place more depressing on the spirits than one of our great state insane hospitals but still those insti- tutions are so interesting in character that they well repay a visit. Not the least striking feature of an insane asy
 lum-in fact 1t is the most striking fea- ture-is the patients, those strange, warp- ed beings who are here assembled to- gether in a motley array of humanity, fallen from its high estate. Some are brilliant in conversation, bright and en- tertaining and the casual visitor would never suspect that they are mentally unbalanced but somewhere in that del- icate mechanism of the brain there is flaw and all their talents avail them nothing. Some of these people imagine they are great personages, living and dead, and their grandiose assumption of power and importance would be ludi- crous were 1t not for their pitiable con- dltion. Kings and emperors are there, men of fabulous wealth and fine ladies who see splendid vistas on the cold grey walls of their rooms and walk abroad with their attendants as potentates sur rounded by a retinue. Nearly all insane hospitals have their collection of nota- bles, poor deluded creatures whose dis ordered minds make puppets of them. Yet, there Is some compensation. It is better to live in splendid palaces of the fancy than to inhabit those cheerless abodes that fall to the lot of pateients