Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-09-07
Good Behavior of the Big String Bean
a Contrast.
AVOIDING CRIME SUSPICION
Gossip Confidential In Office Of the
Editor as to Sellers-Da-da to
Ticket Spectator.

Special Correspondence Of The Stnr.
NEW YORK. September 6, 1907
" HACkERAY said that London dear
ly loved q lord" Had he lived he
might have written whimsical
chapter on how dearly deah old Moo Yawk
| loves princeling. This populace assuredly
did rise to-"fall for in fact-the elon-
gated Observation-Disclosures of that conniving
Bernadotte who, starting out as rookie
in Napoleon's army, wound up on a VI
kings throne. We mobbed him with our
adulation. in truth. We purred for him.
groveling asked him If he liked us. IL
he approved Of our women and their looks,
| If he thought our hotels were fit to be seen,
II he considered that our form Of govern
ment would last little while longer, if
he regarded us as possessing any Innate
sense of refinement; and many other tmid
queries of the same general character, the
answers to which were awaited with fever
ish and breathless expectancy by the indie
pendent and stiff necked Moo Yawkers. Spe-
cial editions Of the pink and green and
mauve and cerise and Alice-blue evening
newspapers were ratified Off, each contain
ing wholly different versions of what the
| loose-jointed Swede thought Of things
here, and the Moo Yawkers who profess the
profoundest contempt for effete monarchical
institutions schemed and contrived to get
themselves invited to one other of the
multitudinous expensive feeds which were
provided for the young man while he lin
gered In this neighborhood. Every time
he climbed into his motor car In front of
| the Hotel Aston, Times Square clutter
ed up with eight Or ten thousand busy and
kingdom despising Manhattanites, all eager
to get the most momentary peek at the al
titudinous young Swede. You have already
been told how the colossal Saturday bunch
at Coney Island so mobbed the tall thin
young chap that mighty Gordon of cops
had to whack a way out for him with
their clubs to take his life out of jeopardy.
1t must be said for the agreeable and
pleasant-mannered young king-to-be from
the 'J"-less land of the Swedes that he
comported himself with decency and dignity
throughout the period of his visit here.
Maybe that can be attributed to his plebeian
ancestry. Had he dated the beginning of
his pedigree back to the crusades-well,
the big town hasn't forget, nor win 1t soon
forget, the way another "sprig of royalty
AS the anarchistical papers put it-be-
haved when he was In New York few
years back. The Duke Boris of Russia
was that gay and gladstone, but by no means
green sprig. Boris was a royal clip and
no mistake. He went at the Tenderloln
like Berserk chasing mountain mutton
on the hoof, and. when the whrl was all
over. what he hadn't seen of the simple
pdStOldl lie III anu AROUND the where IL
is" portion Of this town could have been
rolled up in gunnysack and deposited in
the backyard ash-barrel. Boris made the
periodical swoops of the renowned ''Scotty"
upon New York look like ride on hay
wagon around the outskirts Of Oskaloosa,
Kan, or Eagle Falls, Iowa. When Boris
went away from here, the Americans who
had been officially deputed to show him
what was In process of coming OF around
here were obliged to bestow themselves in
sundry and divers psychopathic wards. to
recover from the delirium tremens as best
they might, and then the royal cut-up went
out OF that place that for q long time
Newport looked as IL II had been the bulls
eye for bombardment of meteors To re-
duce the matter to its commonest denomi-
nator. the Grand Duke Boris wasn't nice
when he was in these parts. and even the
saffronest of the New York papers found 1t
wholly impossible to print even his daily
and nightly Itinerary in New York, much
less recital of his little diversions.
So that the behavior of the clean and
wholesome young man from Sweden looked
good to the New Workers who remembered
the hoydenish land then a little) conduct of
Boris, and it may have been that 1t was
general comparison of this sort that caused
the town to make 50 much of this latest
visitor in whose veins runs the blood Of the
anointed
Democratic sort Of youth. too. this
Prince Wilhelm of Sweden-which oughtn't
to be considered remarkable, remembering
this connection, that there is such a thing
as reversion to ancestral types. Whatever
else he may be, he certainly isn't naughty,
and he possesses that rare thing among
personages of kingly blood, sense Of
humor.
He was making his way from the Hotel
Astor entrance to his automobile one fore
noon, when weakened, smudge-faced
newsboy, who had climbed up on lamp
post. the better to have look, called out
to the prince in a shrill, squeaky voice:
Hey. y big string bean, ye're all right,
seer
And the prince, who is six feet four in
height. and thin In proportion. looked up at
the boy draped precariously around the
lamppost and grinned a thoroughly under
standing and pleasing grin.
An Ounce Of Precaution.
Some curious manifestations of fear on
the part OF men have followed that So
termed ''crime wave" which was so much
talked about over here during the dog days.
It may have been "crime wave" and
then, again, it may have been just the ordi-
nary daily bunch of occurrences of its sort
magnif1ed into "crime wave by the
ochresque afternoon papers of New York.
But whatever 1t was, it has had the eff
feet of making whole lot of decent men
in this town exceedingly nervous with re-
spect to their attitude toward and their
contiguity with women and girls.
There isn't the slightest manner of doubt
that when the "crme wave" nonsense was
at its height over here. scores of men were
unjustly accused and arrested and mobbed
while being arrested by ignorant folk who'd
permitted themselves to be wrought UP by
the carefully built-up stories in the yellow
papers about attacks women and girls.
1t has now come to rass that men keep
ing little shops are actually afraid to wait
upon young women and girl customers
when the latter enter the shops alone
A few days ago 1 was passing along 18th
avenue near 4Sth street when a girl of
eleven or twelve started to enter a clean
looking little bakeshop near the corner. The
man who runs the shop was standing at the
doorway.
what do you want, little girl?" he asked
the child.
"A loaf of Bread she said.
"Well, go in and get it, he told the girl,
not moving from his position outside the
door, The child entered the store, got her
loaf of bread, wrapped it up herself, and,
coming out, gave the nickel to the shop
man.
knew the baker, and I commented to
him upon the curious performance.
You're tired, then, 2" said 1. $50 that
you let folks wait on themselves nowadays
is that it?'
THAT kind of folks" he promptly re-
piled. "And I'm not a bit tired, either.
But don't want to get kicked to pieces by
a mob and then sent to Sing Sing for ten