Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1915-04-23

In the phosophIc line
As man Of culture rare.
You must take up all the germs
or the scientific terms
And plant them sverywhere
OF tho complicated phases
or your Intellectual mind;
The meaning doesn't matter.
IL It's only idle chatter
Mistake. With apologies 70 William s. dilbert.J
The Young Man who had Wandered
In by Mistake let himself down incon-
spicuously into seat in the last row.
IL was the rooms of the American Phi
losophical Society, Independence Square.
lie had seen little groups OF men going
In ever and anon and he thought per-
haps there was an interesting exhibition
inside which he ought not to miss.
There was. The scientific brains of the
world seemed to have gathered together
there for the express purpose OF demon
strating the fact that a meeting could be
conducted in the English language which
was perfectly unintelligible to man
with proud ALB. degree from his alma
mater.
Savants with beetlng brows and sa-
wants with bulging domes that seemed
nigh ready to burst from the erudition
which had been crammed into them sat
round and drank in thrstily the pearls
of wisdom which dropped from the lips
of their learned confreres
a shy little individual OF the bookkeeper
type, who looked as though a 10-mile
sprint In Gods free country might have
done wonders for him, expounded a bit
deprecatlngly, as though he himself were
a little ashamed of knowing so much.
His subject was linear integral equations
in general analysis. The theory, he said.
embraced by specialization the regular
r,F, 81
PLAIN AS A PIKEsTAFF
Fearing that he had not made himself
quite clear to those assembled he hoped.
with bird-like motions, over to black
board and before one could say Jack
Robinson made a series OF hieroslyphics
resembling the curly excrescences thrown
off by planning machine.
And now. gentlemen" he concluded
modestly, I'm sure it's perfectly obvious
to you ALL
He retired amid burst of applause, as
the newspapers would say.
The Man who had Wandered in by Mis-
take did a mental somersault. He took
his gray matter way UP into the top of
the tent and made 1t slide down a creased
wire. He held his head and thought OF
all the equations he had ever heard OF,
but before he could figure II out a hush
had descended upon the room.
A bearded gentleman with Teutonic
face, whose blue eyes twinkled as though
he might have been real human, had
taken the platform. 1t was his intention,
he explained, to give direct solution OF
an equation with analytic kernel"
An old wiseacre with a face like parch-
ment smacked his lips in anticipation. He
hitched his chair forward for the rare
treat and cupped his right ear with his
hand so as not to miss anything.
The gentleman with the Van Dyke was
brief and to the point What he said
however, could never be set up even by
the most expert linotyper But the phi
losophers smiled at the direct and simple
way in which he presented his problem
1t was plain TO see they did not consider
him the technicist of the party.
He was not going to run the risk of be-
ing misunderstood however. and so, not
wlthstanding the tolerant smiles of his
brother scientists. he unfurled a cabalistic
diagram, SO that the gentlemen OF the
press might also understand.
These ignorant persons, realizing the
Joke was on them. masked their chortles
under n knowing look and wrote surrep-
titiOus comments to each other, in which
they hurled inVectives on the heads OF
unfeelIng editors who assigned them to
such Stories"
HOT SHOT FOR GERMAN COPY-CAT.
Now fiery looking professor with a
grim line of determination around his
mouth took the platform. In his hand he
carried a sheaf OF papers which he began
to read Immediately.
The Man Who Had Wandered in by
Mistake cleaned that the speakers spe-
clalty was playing with molecules. atoms
and other such minutiae. But every time
he was careless enough to drop one, 1t
seems, rival in Germany named Ehrn-
dorff (Which may or may not be the way
TO spell ~ was Jared.
Finally in sheer desperation this copy
cat Ehrndortf began dropping molecules
and atoms himself, which was really more
than the gentleman on the platform could
put up with, all things considered The
result was he just had to write this
paper.
"And so, gentlemen" he concluded ag-
gressively, ~ see that 1t is perfectly plain
to you all by this time that there can be
no such thing as a subelectron."
Outside a gentle dove cooed throatily to