The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1917-08-24
chautauqua ooers At Hamilton Yes
to-day Are Given Brand New
Treat by This Troupe
-9 Of Artists.
ONLY TWO DAYS MORE
Programs Both Tomorrow and Sun
day Promise to be Of Consider
@ able Interest to Those &
Who Go.
lRx a Staff Correspondent

by a Staff Correspondent
HAMILTON, ILL.,, Aug. 24.-There
are only two more, days Of the Ham
ilton chautauqua and the sessions of
both Saturday and Sunday will be
worth attending and this evenings
program promises to be especially
good. This evening at 1850, DR.. Wal
ter Aiken Will speak on What an
American Thinks of the U. S. Flag.
The music for the evening will be by
the Milano Italian sextette The
company appears In Neopolitan fancy
costumes.
Saturday afternoon Judge Frank P.
sadler Of Chicago, will speak en-
The Twentieth Century Unrest: It's
Portent, and the music will be fur
nished by the Welsh male quartet.
Saturday evening the Welsh quartet
will give a concert. These men were
passengers on the Lusitania on its
last trip and one of them will tell Of
their rescue from the sinking ship
and of the attendant experiences in
a wreck at sea.
Mr. Shaw Of Bloomington, ILL.,, whG
is manager of the chautauqua circuit
of which the Hamilton assembly is a
part, was at one Of the sessions Wed
nesday and told this story apropos Of
the fact that chautauqua is not only
an educational institution but it is in
spirational as well. He said that on
the walls of bank in Fostville,
Iowa hangs a frame In which is
mounted a cancelled check for 1920.
When chautauquas began to be es-
tablished twenty years ago, a farmer
near Postville thought their town
should have q chautauQua. Nobody
else was very enthusiastic about It
so he put up the money himself, 1920
and started the assembly. Among
those who attended the chautauqua
was young boy in his teens who
caught vision of something bigger
and greater in life than he had be-
fore known. He went to college and
became the originator OF the mission
airy movement among college boys
and girls known as the Student Vol
unteer movement. He became one
of the best known Y. M. G. A. men
in America and was famed too In in
ternational Y. NJ. G. A. affairs. He
became rich, but that part OF 1t was
only incidental. This year when the
president of the United States
wanted commission of men to &c to
Russia to help them stand on their
feet for democracy and to hold them
strong for their place on the eastern
frontier in this world war, he chose
Elihu Root to head the commission,
/ and next to Elihu Root he placed this
boy from PostviIle. Iowa. who had
sat on the front seat in a chautauqua
tent years ago. That boy from Post
vile is John r. Mott.
Swiss Program Interests.
At the chautauqua yesterday there
| was given very unique program
and delightful one as well, by the
Swiss Alpine singers and yodlers.
| There were five in the company.
! wore the picturesque native Swiss
costume. The women wore red cas-
simere skirts, with bright blue apron,
white guimp and a black velvet
bodice laced across the front with q
silver chain. Around their should
ers they wore q small fringed shawl
and their hats were green felt with
white feather sticking up at one
side The men wore knee trousers
embroidered in gay colors with short
ackets and little Alpine hats with a
white feather at the back. The Swiss
people, as everyone knows, have no
language of their. own but speak
French, German and Italian. Among
the mountain people and the herders
they speak a queer patois which is a
combination of all three of these
languages. Most of these yodlfng
songs are In this provincial language.
One man in the company told the
meaning and the history of yodel
calls, which date back 1000 years.
On the mountains are pat ches Of
pasture land called "alms." which are
green during part Of the year, and
are sufficiently large for drove of
cattle to be fed on during the sum-
mer. If the patch is small girl Is
sent up alone to live in the hut up
there and care for the cattle She
takes care Of the milk and makes
butter and cheese. If the aim is
larger a man is sent to take care Of
the cattle and occasionally a family
Is sent to an aim. Now these fertile
spots are miles and miles apart by
the road, but measured by air line
the distance is much shorter. These
yodel calls are a code by which
friends speak to each other across
the mountains. In the clear air of the
Alps one Of these calls will carry for
miles. The program was for the
greater part made up of Swiss songs
with the either accompaniment. The
either is to the Swiss household what
the piano Is to the American home.
The company sang Dixie as the
American Yodel song, they yodeled
the away, away" and 'hurrah, hur
rah" in the chorus. zsf@
Ruth Hemingway Shaw read The
Fourth Estate, as part of the even
ing program. She told In very de-
lightful way, that dramatic newspa-
per story which had such long run
in one of New York's theatres several
years ago.
A feature Of the program Saturday