Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1910-10-23

roll which is expressive Americanese
for Stingy person: equally we're afraid
in fact. we knOW-that the porter himself
Will look upon us I'm the same uncanny
light if We don't produce But why
should we care what the man in the
chair back of us thinks, or what the
predatory porter himself thinks? The
man in the chair back of us doesn't have
to earn our 25-cent pieces, and the por-
ter hasn't any lien on our pocket change
that We know of. The answer is ridicu-
lousy easy; ii is plain coWardice on our
part. / wish / had, today a quarter for
every time i have resolved in the soul
of me not to give the porter quarter
for pushing clinkers further into the wool
of my clothes with his perfunctory Whisk
broom: I'd have quite tidy little accu-
mutation of silvern pieces; but never
once have / failed to crawfish at the
very finish; never once have / failed to
come across with the reluctant and
wholly undeserved and unearned quarter
under the influence of the impaling eye
or the obsequious grin of the porter.
The bell boy who brings pitcher of
ice water to your hotel room expects at
least dime for that service, and he gets
ii virtually every time. Yet there isn't
il reason on earth or in the waters be-
meath the earth why he should get your
money for that service. Ice water goes
with the price of your hotel accommo-
dation; the bell boys are there to fetch
1T to you when YOU want it. but just try
the scheme of not tipping the bell boy
the custom eXacted dime for your pitcher
of ice water and see how your omission
yea, your omission just once-works out.
The word that you didn't come over
Tor your pitcher OF ice water passes
down the line of bell boys almost by the
time you've finished taking your drink
Ia,
tipped you're marked man from that
time on and the amount of bel-punch-
ing or telephoning energy that you're
forced to eXpend thenceforWard in order
TO get your pitcher of ice water almost
would suffice to build a battleship.
Whereupon, after few miserable eXpe-
rlences in waiting, with parched throat
like unto that of Dives, for your ice
water, YOU capituate at any old terms
YOU get. The system differs from
being held up at the point of a gun only
in the method whereby the robbery Is
achieved
There are comparatively recent mani
festations making both for hope and de-
Spair i'll connection with this tipping busl-
ness AS to the despair part of it, the
fact is palpabie to those who get about
a good bit that tipping is on the in
crease, not only to the size of the
tips exacted and conferred but as to the
classes of individuals, performers of va
rious services. who accept tips nowadays.
The size of, the tip seems to grow by
accretion. as il were. Today in what is
known as d good restaurant il you
confer a 2o-cent tip on the waiter VINO
serves you with dollar and a half's
worth of food you are pretty liable to be
regarded sourly.
He wants-yes. and he eXpects.-thirty-
five or fifty cents instead of the quarter
He takes your quarter, but he views you
with a jaundiced eye. and there is a
saturnine expression on his face as he
hands you your hat and stick-if. indeed,
he performs any of these little final
services for you at all. Perhaps. in
order to keep your food bill down 10
dollar and half and to provide for
that tip of a quarter to the waiter you
have denied yourself something on the
bill of fare that you particularly enjoy