The Washington herald., 1917-12-24

Special Correspondent Of The Washington Henl1.
New York, Dec. Gas Samuel Pepys
would record in his diary: Up early
and idling nearly all the morning and
then to the ironmongers to buy some
pounded brass and saw the fair pretty
woman I have lately observed there.
Thence TO call on Frank Tinney. the
minstrel, at the Friars and the talk
is that Bide Dudley, the poet and
playwright. is to so on the stage in
a monoiogue.
We are enduring a lot these days,
but the time may come when the hor-
| rors Of the Paris Commune will be
repeated right here in New York. For
walk through the town and saw
Private Peat. who has come to lee
ture on the war.
Met r. Brinkerhoff, the sketcher,
who tells ME he is shortly to draw
pictures for Mr.. Pulitzcr's paper which
pleases me nightly and We recalled
the days when we lived at the same
boarding house and knew the day of
the week by the bill of fare.
With my wife. poor wretch, for a
ride in r. LillibridSe's new gasoline
chariot which is more fashionable in
shape than any coach he hath and in
| the park where we saw an accident
and two young girls were left sense
less at the roadside.
To an inn for a beaker OF hot coffee
and Africans sang witty melodies and
one in especial about a wounded officer
who said to his fair nurse II don't
want to get WE'LL" caused much laugh
ter
In the evening to n surprise dinner
at the Claridge and each brought a
gift and fetched n cake made into
two tubes like playing dice with the
lucky figure seven on all sides and
there came Miss Ncysa McMein, the
artist. and Jean Knott, the penny
ante sketcher. who Travelled all the
way from St Louis. and all very
merry. Home and then with comfort
to sit with my wife, and get her to
read to me, and TO bed, with my mind
at mighty ease.
Down on Park Row there Is one of
those old-fashioned saloons that still
serves free lunch. 1t proves a boon
to imprOvidential reporters at the
straggly end of the week before pay
day.
The lunch is so situated that a pa
tron may walk through, reach out
and grab off a tempting morsel and
pass on out of the rear door without
making a liquid purchase.
The other night a well-known jour-
nalist breeZed into the front door,
walked briskly to the lunch counter.
reached out and speared a hot weiner-
wurst, stuck it in his pocket and
started for the rear door.
He was just about to step out when
there was an agonized wall from the
bar keep, who leaped over the ma
hogany with a bung-starter in his
hand. Come back here" he shouted.
The newspaperman looked around The
weinerwursts were strung together and
had not been clipped apart and so he
was dragging about fifteen yards OF
them after him before he was tor
pedoed.
Some people are always taking the
joy out of life. A mother and her
young son went into a Broadway res
taurant of the self-serving type. AT
the same table there came a street
corner Santa Claus. Santa removed
his hat, whiskers and gloves and sat
down to eat. paying no attention to
the little fellow. He not only spoiled
the boys meal but he spoiled a fine
Christmas illusion.
The ruling passion is economy. And
the ruling fashion is to talk about il.
Thrift, a virtue hitherto exercised al
most exclusively in New England, has
descended upon lavish. lobster palaced
New York and captured it so irretriev-
ably that upholstered females who
used to compete in luncheon favors
and limousine fittings now vie verbally
in manufac curing menus calculated TO
give their consumers a maximum nu-
triton with a minimum of pleasure.
We have lightless. meatless, heatless.
wheatless and beefless days and more
coming.