The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1906-09-10
Chicago Tribune.)


appreciated than in the stormy little
city of the Dowieites and volivdns. The
absence OF the theatre. dance hall and
other forms of entertainment. the in
terdiction of cards. billiards, pool and
other games, the disfavor in which
newspapers and comic periodicals have
been held. and perhaps most Of all the
natural reaction from frequent and
long winded solemn assemblies seems
to have created a humor hunger among
these people.
The most successful leaders of these
devoted followers have been those who
could make them laugh loudest and
longest. AS all the world knows. John
Alexander Dowie has a canny Scotch
temper. Besides, he has a broad humor
and an inimitable drollery that have
sometimes brought his audiences to the
verge of Mysteries AS for Voliva many
of his partisans think that if he should
be ousted from his uneasy throne he
could forsake the ministry and make
good as a comedian. Judge V. V.
Barnes, almost universally loved and
respected in Zion City, and a man
whose influence among these peculiar
people cannot be overestimated, is a
charming story-teller, and his anec-
dotes are so popular that ripple of
mirthful anticipation sweeps through
the audience every time he rises to
speak. Overseer Daniel Bryant who
made great record as a Zion leader in
South Africa. and who is just now dear
to the hearts of Zionites at headquar-
ters, caught a big audience on his first
appearance after his return from South
Africa by doubling them up with
laughter over d humorous description
of his tussle with NAL de mer on his
departure from Cape Town.
Dr. Dowie's favorite form of wit is
the pun. With it he is often quick, and
sometimes makes double or triple plays
on words that are ingenious to say
the least. For example. he was once
examining one of his witnesses to di-
vine healing before a large audience
The subject told narrowing story of
a surgical operation he had undergone
during his illness.
What doctors operated on your
asked the preacher.
''DT. Griffin, DR.. Muchmore and Dr.
Hyde" was the response.
''Hh." observed the noted -scoffer at
medical science, dryly. ''if that Griffin
had done Muchmore to YOU you would
not have had any Hyde left
AS is well known TO those who have
heard him frequently, the modern Eli
jah is one of those who hold that a
good joke improves with age and hard
usage. He has a stock of time tried
and fire. tested bonmots that never fail
| TO get their hearty laugh from his au-
dience. The naive air Of pleased an
ticipatiOn with which he springs a pun
for the 7,659th time is much funnier
| than the quip itself ever was 1t is
| said I'm Zion City that there are few
/ sermons of the reverend doctor within
| the memory Of the Oldest Zionite in
which he has not declared that those
who drink champagne at night get real
pain in the morning"
! He was preaching in Zurich, Switzer-
! land. i'm 1904, before an audience of
| GeTman-speaking people, his address
| being through an interpreter. In the
! course of his sermon the good old pun
about the champagne was trotted out
with all the doctors usual gleeful relish
/ Of good laugh. The interpreter gave
a literal translation, and, of course, the
play on the words was entirely lost
! The audience sat stolid The prophet
| bewildered surprise was worth seeing.
| He repeated the sentence, laying great
stress on the words on which the joke
/ turned. Once more the interpreter,
none too familiar with English. strug-
| gled through the translation. The peo-
| pie. hearing only the emphatic repeti-
| ton of a commonly accepted fact,
added polite mystification to their Sto-
! lidity. Again the strenuous founder of
Zion City got off his pet pun. This
time he fairly shouted it. then turned
| to the interpreter and said, soto voce,
with some irritation: Don't you see
| Champagne, sham pain; sham means
not real" Precipitation broke out all
over the fioundering linguists face as
! he bravely plunged into an attempt to
carry the pun bodily over from Eng
/ lish to German. When he had finished,
! limp and breathless. the SPECIFICATION
| of the audience was complete. Then
| one of the general overseer's party on
the platform whispered few words in
his ear. Suddenly he saw a great light
and joined heartily in the laugh at his
! own expense.
The unquestioning acceptance of their
| leaders every utterance by the faith
full often led to laughable blunders At
| every baptism service that he conduct
i ed it was Mr.. Dowie's custom to have
/ all candidates fill out what were called
! "ba ptism cards" These he told them,
over and over again. so that no one
might misunderstood. must bear the
! full name, residence, age. occupation,
/ elC. VI edCi VI lIltiT SlBHtTS. Speaking
/ in his well known, broad Scotch accent,
! he pronounced the word full as if 1t
had been spelled fool" After one of
| these services a letter was received
! from a woman who had received the
ordinance of baptism asking why her
name had been omitted from the pub
lished list. II wrote my fool name on
/ the card just as the general overseer
told me to- she said.
Several ludicrous blunders OF DR.
Devices interpreters on his foreign
trips have become classic in Zion City
During one of the doctors meetings in
Paris his remarks were being done
into French by a young Partisan who
had studied English a few months in
| London. In the course of his address
the prophet of Zion City got on the
trail of 'the unspeakable hog" AMONG
other things he had against the porkel
was his immunity from rattlesnakt
poison The word rattlesnake was 9
new one to the interpreter, but this
was no time for consulting dictionaries
Something had to be supplied. and thai
Immediately. In desperation the youns
man used the French word for flea. He
had read somewhere that swine were