Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-05-17
pays OF ROMANCE
GET SECOND VIM
Notion That Modern Tina.
Matter Of Fact Is Divine AIe
Natural Death--Some Hans.
That Recall Days of Yore

w toned to the idea that Pow. locus
not thrive in the modern f,ela ,hat se ooea
that exotic flower drops its cr,r,..s "nen
ais at our feet we have been ,s.,,' pet
Drush tnem aside as If they were CART. ,,Ss .
leaves The moving tale from p,,b,,S !, se
other day was actually discredl,os .'e
many persons. although offic,ai,,, - - py
for, and received obscure ,nent,o0 a. 40neo
OF the newspapers. Joseph Plun,,n,. -,.ose
one OF the Irish rebels. He vas ss was
with Pearse and court.martialoa ~. "a
II was known that he must die his t,ara.. .oa
Miss Grace Clifford, appeared az p,ss
mond Barracks and they were rooss,0a e,'
Then, in the dawn of a perfeot ,,,s'..-.' 's.,eu'
of early May, Plunkett was Ioa ~. us
the firing squad. There was a ,,,,..s
order crash of rifles, and he fell ''1
This is not really romantic to,. :. !,
stands, though it is the basis for =.
mendous one. Real romance yvonid
have the hero die. because Ro,nora. !,
that spirit of kindness which ero,,-
wildly in the human heart that n oor,,,.s',
up the most grotesque and dreadfu, 49,,
ties in order to show, by averting tb.s.
horrors at the last minute the fun ov,ss..
of its own unearthly power. II is o,,,.
because Romance carries the kinris ra.
don in its breast pocket that IL daro. ].
put its heroes in dire peril of the es,.s
squad. And the fact that there vo. 20
kings pardon in Dublin few Nav davr,,s
ago shows that the sense Of romance 4
London is temporarily atrophied.
Heroics in Gulps
But the evidence is right before us n
any paper we pick up. Take this con,od
quite at random: There was dagger a.
the bottom of the boat. l could see ths
footprints of three men in the sand. Tbev
led away from the boat and in the dIreo.
tion of my home. Nearby hole had
been dug in the beach, and there found
a tin box bound round with cord" What's
this? A breathless moment from Robert
Louis Stevenson? Not bit of 1t. Part
of the evidence in the trial of Sir Roger
Easement in yesterdays news dispatches
nance has been with us all along ana we
actually didn't taste it because we rot
1t in such big gulps. M
If a page of ancient history told us Of
O,0O0.0 900 men fighting all over Europe we
would grow enthusiastic over it as mora
hero!cs than the tale of the
Spanish Armada. But there is a ten.
lency to take the contemporary actually
rs drab and unpicturesque procedure
We thrill over the flashing blades Of the
but speak of the dull routlne
IF the trenches" Now this idea is all
wrong. 1t assumes that a Mauser and
l2.centimeter are 'prosaic mechanismsg
ind that arquebuses and battering rams
we're natural and unmechanical weapons
But they weren't. They were highly
complex and sophisticated machines
When it comes to the prosaic, the process
,f pounding a hole in wall with bat
ering ram looks stupid when compared
With hostile flight over the North Sea.
1t has been the chief reproach against
'ur age that it has not seen the poetry
f it's own mechanisms while gloatinG
ver the poetry of mechanisms of old
low of romance on stroll near the
1odern aqueduct but it never occurs to
hem that 1t might have seemed prosaic
D pair of Roman lovers to stroll in tho
hadow of the ancient Roman aqueduct
len have talked of the pyramids OF
Egypt as if their origin were as poetical
S the building of castles in Spain. But
% n fe
ideous page in the history of industry
lan any an l. w. w. man ever wrote
{ Pittsburgh blast furnace toilers.
Beautifying Mechanisms
1t is this error which is responsible for
Ich notions as the one expressed by an
.herwise clever man: How absurd 70
rye City Beautiful and at the same
me philadelphia the Workshop of the
vorldr" The idea being that workshop
.nnot be beautiful, chiefly on account Of
noke But it is, or should be, gen
ally known commonplace that tne
noke of industry is waste and abso
tely unnecessary. 1t cannot only %
yept from the face of our cities Win
It also put to work
The fundamental reason for our delay
making modern mechanisms beautlul
that they are too new to have earnea
literature to give them romantic tfA
ion. But that tradition is being buit
cry day before our eyes The war
tting the final clincher TO 1t. To NY
a constant atmosphere of heroic deedS
to raise 'all the implements Of thoss
eds to the plane of the heroic Be
use that literature is in the newspaper
her than in books should only add 70
, zest of the romance. 1t was no more
,rious to have ones head struck on py
leadsman of yore than to face dozen
,dern rifles and die for ones eonyio'
MS. H. D. ~
NATIONAL. POINT OF VIEW