Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1917-07-21
A CENSOR>WITH A HEART
He Passes Without Excision Paper Eolteo Ny
Twenty-seven Children and SUD-
scribes for 1t
By HENRI BAZ1N
sta1 Correspondent Of the Euenno Ledger IN frdhce'

, first TO Rouen, where II was acknoWleuseu
| and forwarded to Biarritz and Lyons. bu'
| en- route from Lyons TO little ViIiase az
| the swiss border II disappeared. Inc eul
| tors after n period Of anxious waiting
began a daily interrogation Of the postman
Je had Abut the proverbial courteous sIi'lie
| of the Latin and a negative response l@neu @
| one day during the last week the ruiils
spirit asked his father, home en- perfnission
| from the front, II Il were not possible 10
| 'end out about it. The father spilingly
| renled he could do nothing likely the
| censor Has to blame.
Vexat Censura Columbus"
"Tbe censor why. of course! That was
l,, without doubt The entire issue was
| likely living upon his desk at that very
moment upon the desk of heartless crea-
ture armed with enormous sclssors' eica
ture without a soul. All sorts of calami-
Ties confronted the editors--prison, perhaps
And the oldest, who had begun the study
OF Latin, repeated aloud in tragic fashion
a line from his study book;
"'Dat venam corvis vexat censura CO.
lumbas.' ,.
fat enYelope, a registered letter Even
in its ehveloped disguise the editor-n-chief.
with his brother and sister assistants-in-
chief, recognized their single issue. Hur-
riedly they opened it, searching its pages
for the mark Of the blue pencil the red
pencil, The mutilated places obliterated by
merciless shears. To their astonishment,
the Twenty-seven was intact. and instead
of censOring it contained an additional
article upon its lone white page.
Ny Dear Little Friends-You thought
to escape the censor You cannot. Nor
can others. He has, in his official
capacity read line for line and page for
page. He has performed this duty to
France with great pleasure and great
JOY. He finds nothing to warrant taking
his pencils from behind his ears, the red
behind the right, the blue behind the left,
nor to remove his scissors from his
drawer; on the contrary, much that
demonstrates the blood that Is the pride
of the whole world today. Ee bows in
homage before it.
And he respectfully apologies for
having been compelled to exercise his Of
ficial function, for penetrating within the
borders of select clientele, and asks to
be included among these subscribers for
the future. To that end he makes bold
enough to pose for an instant as twenty
eighth editor in this contribution in words
and to inclose a contribution in fact as
subscription for each and every future
issue printed, perhaps, he respectfully
suggests, upon little press which the
subscription may enable the editors to
buy. THE CENSOR.
In separate envelope lay Clean
crisp, new banknote for 100 francs
The Twenty-seven, even the tiniest
quivered with delight and surprise their
fathers smiled, their mothers thought the
censor was charming.
But l entirely disagree with them. I
say it with feeling, as a writer who has
looked upon the dread, dreary white space
In the middle of his article / say it is
criminal to thus plant deeply in the minds
OF twenty-seven future French men and
women firm. ineradicable belief that the
censor Is good and smiling fairy, who
guards and protects the writer and his art
and aids him in securing deserving publicity
for his articles"