The Washington herald., 1918-09-21

New York. Sept. 2o.-Gay bon
yivants, those materialized sunbeams
in spats. known to New York as club
men. are becoming extinct. The bay
windows of the Fifth avenue clubs.
their lounging places. are as hare as
Mother Hubbard's widely press
agented cupboard.
In the old days they were the life
Of the party" the little rays OF gun
shine flooding the darkcned grill
rooms. When the war came they had
more dependents than a Russian i'm
migrant
OF course the dependents were
mixers Of pink appetizers, makers OF
monogrammed cigarettes. designers
Of silk scarves. ladies of the chorus
and hard-working manicure girls, but
they were dependents just the same
and looked to the clubman and his
brotherly generosity for their support.
The confirmed clubman. peculiarly
New York species, was never in
trade. That smacked too much OF
the bourgeois. He had an Office 10
be sure where his rents were col
lected. The rents came from estates
of grandparents who ate pie with
their knives and half-soled their
breeches with coon-skin.
Now and then the clubman would
visit his office which would be sig
nalized by the firing Of an office boy,
! sending a couple of wirelesses, light
! ing cigarette, setting the waste
basket on fire. yelling for a taxicab.
, and then rushing out-winging cock
tail enroute.
When the war broke out they did
| their bit by ignoring sauerkraut, lift
| ing their eyebrows at the mention of
the Crown Prince and making puns
about the Teutonic verbs that button
I up the back.
Then the members of the club, who
were not clubmen in the New York
sense, but who now and then visited
the clubrooms for an evening of lei
sure, began to appear in their khaki
uniforms. Some came and shook
hands all around and were seen no
more.
| Still others did not visit the club at
all but their names showed up now
| and then in the casualty list. All
! OF this began to get on the nerves
/ OF the club lounger. He noticed a
/ certain effort OF regular members u
/ avoid him. He became club IshmaeI
/ a lOODglOunRnlg OulCdSl.
| At the seashore where he went for
] solace, it was the same. Men came
on leave in uniforms. Veranda hounds
were not popular with the young de-
| butantes. So it came about that all
/ at once as IL by some concerted
| action the New York clubman dis
| appeared. Nobody knows where ne
went and very few care.
There is war famine in small
safety deposit boxes in New York. At
/ present they are practically nOn-eNist-
ant They hold the valuab ables OF meu
who have gone to the front and the
/ demand for them is increasing much
more rapidly than the bankers can
find supply.
/ Fine trotting bays and neat horse
. drawn vehicles burst forth on Fifth
/ avenue and Broadway with a pleas
4 ant Clatter on the first gasoline-less
| Sunday. The few liverymen left were
/ swamped with orders they could not
half fill The parks were motorless
and only the horse and carriage oc-
! Cupied the smooth driveways. BIZ
/ cycles were also pressed into serV-
/ ice and the few dealers who had
/ them reaped a harvest. The old
! fashioned art OF walking was also re-
( Vived and all the sidewalks were
, crowded. At one hotel one hundred
! motor tourists who had not heard or
the new ruling were told about il and
| they gladly delayed their tours for
one day.
Wilzon Miner, White Way boule-
| vardier and creator Of the line Life
is a tough proposition and the first
hundred years are the hardest" has
been regaling Broadway while acting
as a court witness this week. Miner
I swatted a movie actor in a row over
a Follics beauty and was arrested.