Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-07-30
Special Correspondence of The Star

NEW YORK. July -, 1871.
~ NIGHTS, lately, at various
highly Illuminated places
where you've got to go Il YOU
80 anywhere for time-passing
purposes in New York. I've
met one or two million male persons of
my acquaintance whose wives are out OF
town.
They're the dismal looking fellows.
Understand me. please. | don't mean
TO say that they're not there with the
scenery, that they're not grcomy appear
ing and that they're not each and all
executing that stunt colloquially known
"a ''chucking a bluff
But they're the dsmal-looking cusses,
all the same: to the discerning eye, that
Is. TO the eye, perhaps one should say,
of Teller who knows how it is himself
There's something subtly dreary about
'em. They ring holloway. that is. Their
oh-so-merriness is a palpable pose. They
look lost. in brief: not lost in the sense
that their souls are irremediably wreck
ed but lost in that sense of goneness.
Most of 'em 7 observe drink more than
customary and more than they ought to-
and their drink, instead of distillinG chrk
in their spirits, only sends gloom mount
ing To their forehead>. They try TO
make each other believe that they re
having a bachelurish kind Of time
with head wagginEs about this, that and
tother, where they've been what they've
done. and what they're going to debut
il won't do: it's coarse work. Tie gone
hess is there.
several times, 10 test EN-, I've suggest
cd to these siad-sad ducks whose wives
Of he hot
seeing how footioose and all like that
that they are. why. what would be the
matter with sort O lighting up and show
ing the town just how much could be
done by busy little rovsterers between
the hours of III i'm the evening. and say,
IN the morning. Merely To test en- out,
nothing else.
Did airy one Of en- respond to that
mad-bad invitation or suggestion
Nary one. It's hard even to get a
bunch OF EN- together to make UP a
poker quota, despite the cute little pic
lures in the funny papers of the wild
poker orgies that are supposed TO take
place in the apartments Of feIers whose
spouses are out of town. with siphons
and cigarette butts and upside-down bot
lies and discarded decks OF cards and
things lying all over the rugs Nix on
The poker. they say. Too hot Too cool
Too some old thing, always.
DO you know what think? 1 TO put
too fine point upon it, do u know
what l know?
Why this: About % per cent of these
phonily glad chaps whose wives are out
Of town, and who sort OF rnooch .round
downtown for a few hours o nights try
ing to make themselves believe that
they're having the time of their lives
about % per cent OF EN- stink off 10
their homes long toward 10 or ii o'clock,
switch on the light over the desk, and
write love letters to their wives.
i know whereof l write and speak. I've
seen the buffers do il. I've caught doz-
ems OF EN- at IL. I've dropped in on
'em. casual-lke, and I've found them all
het up with the agony OF composition,
and they've embarraSsedly cnucked their
eightecn-page letters into their desks and
pretended to be listening 70 the chatter,
and then they'd say, Scuse, please,
while | finish this little note TO my
tailor" and then they'd write four pages
more of love stuff 70 the spouse, making
twenty-five pages in all! and then put the
booklet into a big envelope and slap
three two-ccnt stamps and special de-
livery stamp ON the envelope and adj
dress il to their absent wives. and then
they'd sink out to the hall to have the