The Birmingham age-herald., 1920-02-28
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

mine lB very poOT oHSf ahU '" "A4AS Kipling may have been dead right when he wrote his poem few years ago. he would have to change it now, for 1T. my opinion they have come together in the person of Dhan Gopal Murkerji
 
 Now I am willing to confess that [ had never heArd of the gentleman un- til I read in Thursday mornings Age- Herald that he was graduate of Cal cutta, Tokio and Leland-sta 2ford Uni versailles This in itself was sufficient to excite my curiosity. for to say the least of it. 1t is most extraordinary from an educational standpoint. I had another engagement for the afternoon, but always in my subcon- sciousness was the idea that l would wind up by hearing him lecture before the Drama League in the ballroom of the Tutwiler, and sure enough I got laway from my engagement in time to consider going to hear the East Indian poet and dramatist deliver his address on "Tagore and the Hindu Dramatists." 1 It's, true I arrived a bit late, and taking the elevator I got off at ths second floor. but 1 saw no evidence tfat anything was going on in the ball. room. No maid was visible to watch wraps, no mems hats were hung on the racks, but everything was quiet and there was nothing to lead me to be : lieve that something was being staged in the famous dining hall, which has been the scene of so many of Birmingham's activities.
 |
 1 I thought I had gotten the date wrong. but to be sure, I got off the elevator and turned the corner to see in front of me the door darkened with what I thought were heavily draped oriental curtains. for it had gone out that there was to be an East Indian Iatmosphere created so that the native poet might feel at home in his western surroundings.
 I thought it was part of the seen cry and so I walked up and was about to try to part the draperies when I perceived that 1t wasn't curtains at all. but heavy carpet suspended from the gallery to the floor, entirely blocking the entrance. I could hear low talk on the other side. and by this time my curiosity was excited and felt that was on the eve of an ad- l venture as I retraced my steps and mounted the stairs to the third floor. |
 Were you ever at formal recep- tion in the afternoon when the shades were drawn and the rooms lighted artificiaIly, when in bounced the boy of the home in his school clothes | without any thought of the guests and see the look on his mothers face and the abashed surprise written on his, as he stood blinking, as he stood first on one foot and then on >the other? is liable to happen in the best regu- | lated families
 l Now, that is the way felt on Thurs day afternoon when I opened a door and expected to get into a room dark | ened, and for a mornent stood dazed as I looked down into the faces of one of the most cultured audiences l had ever seen gathered in Birmingham; for instead of the platform being at the far end of the room, as is usually the case, it had been set against the main entrance, and I saw every eye turned on me; for had come in late For the moment l had sympathy for the boy who rushes unaware into the presence of company.
 l made my way to the side lines. but from my point of vantage I could see both the speaker and the audience and it was some study in facial ex. pression, for the only bit of orienta scenery In evidence was the turbar on Dhan Gopal Murkerji's head ane
 the suspended carpet, for the glare oI ithe afternoons light flooded the room and outlined a man who., save for his
 headsear, was clothed in an ordinary
 collar. colorless cravat and choco
 late spats.
 |
 ing myself, for on the front row al
 most beneath the speaker sat Rob
 ert Jemison, Jr.. drinking in oriental
 isms with the dignity of an Indiar . pundit and on the left sat Charles A
 Brown, principal of the Central Higi
 School, and I was perched above then
 in the gallery; but the ladies wer
 out in large numbers, and among then were representatives of the best ther, is in the social and religious life o the city.
 am not going to pretend that an
 tremendously interested in Hind,
 poetry or that I have any yearnine even after hearing he distinguishe, lecturer to sit through Hindu drama for in spite of my attempts to reat
 up on India and its literature. I hay,
 rever been able to enthuse over it poets and dramatists from the simpl, , fact that I am westerner of tn, westerners. and am not in tune witl
 the thought of the Orient.
 } I confess that there were parts O his address which were really poeti
 cal and strangely thrilled me. not s,
 much his quotations from the poets O. the dramatists, but his own. descrip
 tions for instance. of how night come r lin the jungle, or silence falls upol l the desert. or the dawn awakes on tn
 mountains. I thought he was happ,
 in making his word pictures stand ou vividly But the most realistic bit h, did, in my opinion was in his tribut f11 rt1 fI.-.