New Britain herald., 1922-12-16
THE OBSER YER
Makes Random Observations
 On the City and Its People

The Chicago National league base
 ball club brides itself on having men
 who are, 1t claims, the tallest, the shortest and the strongest in the ma
 jor leagues. It says. therefore. that IL stands quite alone. Granted. As a baseball team the Cubs" are
 unique. But what was the aim of the teamg Was it to be unique? If. for instance. 1t could boast of pos sessing the man who could throw the ball the greatest distance of any ball player in the world, the man who could hit the ball farther than any one else and the man who had the most nearly perfect "batting eye" then the team would have had some- thing to boast of along the lines of its reason for existing. All of which re- minds that height, shortness of stature or great strength do not es- pecially fit man to be a good ball player. The matter reminds, too, of the little fellow who, boasting. even after an unsuccessful battle with an- other -youngster remarks: You licked me, all right: but my big brother kin play pool better n your big brother can."
 It's bad habit a lot of Us have. Like the Cubs, who did not win the pennant, we are inclined to balance our shortcomings in the direction Of the work in which we are engaged by boosting that, at any rate. we can do something else better than any one in the world.
 Those who drive automobiles in snow or over slippery ice for the first time this winter-and "old timers" as welfare having some exciting ex- periences. if the Observers observa- tions tell him the truth. The chances taken by those who do not outfit their Cars with chains are apparent to any one who stands beside hill and watches the cars negotiating 1t and attempting to do so. Not only do those cars without chains get entirely out of the control of the driver in many instances, but the driver some times loses control of himself when he or she notes the first indication that there is going to be a skidding. All of which makes the Observer wonder if an automobile without chains does not become pretty dan gerous. affair when the streets are slippery or covered with deep snow.
 For the benefit of those who re- marked upon the reproduction of rhymins lines in this column last week the Observer begs to give the | information that ability to produce rhymes, or near-rhymes. is not sign of advanced civilization. From the earliest times man. when under deep has sought to reduce his feelings to poetry. The more primi- time the emotion, the more primitive the rhyme, as rule. It has been hinted, even, that the unintelligible chattering of. the monkey species par takes of the nature of the rhyme, and that the early origin of the dance, poetry" even, was due to the inability of the savage to. .ex- press himself.
 no reflection upon the serious-faced person WHO brought 1eW lines to the Observer few days ago. The per son was eminently respectable, but was evidently laboring under great The person refused to state what the trouble was, but silently and with great dignity handed the Ob- 'erver the lines he had written, wiped 1is eyes with a large, silk handker- chief. and walked out. The lines are reproduced as representing. the emo- ions that may be stirred in the heart 'f an otherwise sane indiudual by 'ome burning question. listen to some people talk
 I wonder why they care
 That coal is scarce-their talks
 enough
 To generate hot air.
 He was only small boy but he vas game: Obstacles were something , o be overcome but nothing to hin- Ter, so far as he was concerned. If , le tackled job and found it hard, it meant nothing except that it was title harder than usual-that 1t might {