The Washington bee., 1911-07-15
Public Men And ThinDs.
(By the Sage of the Potomac.)

uIOppCu III DOO WdflnS once
the other day, and before my pres
ence was observed, discovered the
Negro Sylvester, Blackstone and
Charles Dickens all rolled into one
virile being, abstractly and earnestly
gazing at photo of a stunning bit
of femininity whose raven locks were,
hguratively, floating out from under a
gainsboro hat decorated with a huge
willow plume. Sly old Bob, whom we
| thought was callous to feminine graces
and waists, and proof against the
smiles and charms of all descendants
| of the fifth rib, seems to have fell d
victim to the artful lodges of
| "melady" love- Well, it's about time.
The top of BOb's head is getting to
be as thinly populated with hair as
the north pole is with white men,
and corpulency is setting in with a
vengeance, all of which is sure
| sign that old age is coming along
Itolerably fast. It's now or never
with him, and if rumor is not a mere
spring freshet, his ex-bluecoatship
will soon be soliloquizing-"As we see
| it is all a mistaken Identity If Bob
| Waring, who practices law from ne
cessity, and writes an occasional novel
from conceitedness, should renounce
bachelorhood and tie up with one of
those figures we see in a hobble on
the RialtO, the rest of these bachelors
who have had their habitat in Wash
ington since Hector was a pup, ought
to take courage, and get themselves
a shrew.
Speaking about Robert Louis Ste
phenson Waring, who, after many
threats, broke into the. literary cir
Gle with a novel novel, reminds me
that the authOr-laWyer was, and is,
possessed with an ambition TO sue
ceed Jim Cobb as special Assistant
District Attorney. Some men, no
matter what you feed them on, will
chase phantOms Now the author
lawyer Is chasing the fleetest phantom
and the darndest will-o-wisp that
ever oozed out of imagination when
he nurses an ambition TO displace Jim
Cobb, the Louisiana bachelor with
fancy for deep red ties If ever a
man had a strangle hold on his Job
that man is the one who uses Jim"
for a given name, and connects it to
a name that is suggestive of a fell
low who gets enc or two base hits
in every game Bob never gave any
thought to the requisites for the job.
1t never occurred to him that his
practice, like the skirts the women
wear now, is very limited to warrant
such an ambition, and it never oc-
Cured to him that as yet he hasn't
written his name so awfully darn high
on the barrister's roll. He just got
! it into his bald pate that he wanted
it, and so he asked for it. Some how
really like his nerve If you
haven't got nerve you won't be able
| to sit up at nights to watch the stars
go out, or linger abstractly in front
| of a photo of some bewitchlng bit
| of femininity 1t takes nerve to do
anything once. That BOb's got the
nerve argues that some day, when he
disabuses his mind of the imagination
that he's destined for the Charles
| Dickens class, and chases away the
gap-filling idea that he's created to
regulate all men and all things, he'll
| fit in some niche nicely. He's a
| bright limb of the Waring tree. In
| fact you never saw Waring that
was not bright-it's a bright family.
l But one or two of them, especially
Bob and his brother Jim, are obsessed
with the "better-than-thOu' notion.
/ This notion has put many a bTainy
chap down and out If Bob Waring
| harnesses his brain motor to law
strictly, and unhitches himself frOr'
| the narrow, One-seated envy hearse,
there's no reason on earth why he
shouldn't be heard from, for it's in
him to be a big noise around here if
he curves his balls right He's got
the brains, and he's got the energy,
and he's a mighty peert looking chap
too, and looks and brains hitChed to-
getheT can give fellow the inside
track in life's race.
x ( =
| How long should a man go with a
woman before he marries herr" This
| question was put to me by a vision III
white while | sat in the bow of the
late River Queen coming up the Po-
tomac from St Luke's picnic | told
her vision III white that ''it all de-
pends upon the exigencies of the sit
uation that has a bearing on the fu-
ture" That philosophical, Huxley
laden reply caused her 36-inch bust to
heave like a blacksmith's bellows.
and she looked far away, as if trying
to peer through the curtains of future
in an effort to catch a glimpse of the
hereafter Suddenly she came to, and
with her madonna face upturned to
mine, whispered, in soft purring tones
like the swish of Almond SCOTS
auto: Would six months be long
enough?" | wiped the perspiration
from my Websterian brow, and in my
most charming tones, a la Sumner
| Wormley, said dearest Asphasia, six
months wouldn't be long enough to
get acquainted with a Washington
girls fancies. Why, / know some
men here who have been going with
the same girl, regularly, consistently,
and exclusively since the Revolution
ary War, and they are still unmar-
ried The girls that use to be are
now spinsters with burrows in their
brows, and the young men who use
to was are now patriarchs. You bet
ter go and ask them this momentous
| question:
"Them?" she piteously cried. using
near-pure English, who is thems ?"
Hastily taking out my pencil l wrote
| down the names Of two or three cou-
pies in Washington who have been