, 1923-04-08

IT was a sudden tipping over OF
something solemn. She had spent
her life getting ready for the holt
ness of matrimony. She had made
a wreck of her ideal and mad dweIt
in a hell OF shame and remorse for
h sacrilege.
And now Tommy had implied that
It wasn't so sacred after all. He
had slipped n banana peel under a
tlsmal ideal and It had hit the
grou with a bump. Tho whole
world ooked gayer to her. as II some
ono had flashed on a light.
She hoped h automobile would
not be wrecked before she had this
huge laugh that was waiting for her.
n somewhere in a clowns uniform
was waiting. she was sure. the man
or the career that would illuminate
all her existence. A good laugher
would make a good lover.
Making people cry and educating
them in tho aEonies OF sympathy
was a silly sort OF ambition. What
fools people were to pay money to DO
torturedl
But to be made to laugh-that was
worth any price. To make people
laugh IN the little while between the
two glooms before birth and after
death-to love and live LAUGHING
that was to defy borrow and to mako
a tke OF fate.
CHAPTER xLvIu
Nothing could reveal the extreme
youth and the swifth maturity of the
moving pictures like the career of
Charles Chaplin. For q few years
ne was a byword OF critical condem-
nation for his buffoonery. n proof OF
the low public taste. Suddenly he
was hailed as one OF the master mr.
lists of time. 1t was not that he had
improved. or the public. 1t wa tho
critics who wero educated In spite
of themselves to the holiness of bur-
fooncry and the fine genius of Chap
lin. The public had loved him from
tho start.
He was at this moment in Europe
meeting such a welcome as few
other visiting monarchs ever got.
Mobs locke the streets where he
progressed until the police had to
rescue him. Their Eminences of lit
erature and statecraft pleaded with
him for Interviews. Lloyd George
begged for n comedy OF Charles to
help him.. as Abraham Lincoln leaned
on Artemus Ward.
/ Ana yet he was Just out of Id,
twenties and. only n dozen years or
so before he had left England as tho
mbl of acrobats and the least
known OF her emigrants, as ignored
as he was himself ignorant OF the
newborn American.made art that
was to lift him TO universal glory.
His picture. "Tho Kid" had been
hailed as n work of tho noblest quail
lily. rich in pathos az in hilarity. so.-
emn editorials proclaimed him the
supreme dramatic artist of his gen.
Grafton.
, He was a household word about
! the world. a millionaire. n as IA
!, miliar to the children as Santa
1 Claus. He han become a Santa Chap
/, lin to the grown.ups.
Yet numberless raucous asses who
were quite as solemn as Charlie. but
= not so profitably or amusingly ash
nine. were still hee.hawing the old
bray that tho moving pictures were
no an art. but only an industry. OF
course It all depended on ones own
private definition OF the indefinable
word art" n It was quite over.
looked by those who denied the word
to the NOVA hat II It were only an
Industry II was n glorious industry.
Mark Twain decided that II Shakes
peare's plays were not written by
Shakespeare. they were written by
some n else of the same name. So
II the movies are not an art. they are
something else quite as artistic.
To Remember steddon they wers
her first language for expressing her
turbulent self. To her they were
philosophy and criticism of life;
painting and sculpture given motion
and infinite velocity with perfect re-
cord. They were many wonderful
things to Men MS to the myriads OF
bright spirits hal had flocked to
this new banner. golden calf. or
brazon serpent, as you will. And
now Mem. having tasted OF the sor-
rows OF the movies. was athirst for
the light wine. Clowning at it's best
is a supernal wisdom. and Chaplin's
Tho Idle Glass; was full of laugh
ter that had an edge-a on
humanity. a rejoinder. If not an an
swer. to the riddles of existence and
its conduct.
He played a dual role IN this pic
ture. both a swell and the tramp he
had made as classic as Pierrot. Ac-
cording to what plot there was. the
aristocratic loafer n tippler OF the
first Improvisation forgot to meet
his wife at the train. the train on
which the tramp had stolen a rids
TO his favorlte resort.
There was mockery not only Of
pompous toffery. but OF serious emo
ton MS wei. When tho besotted
young swell receives from his neg
lected wife a letter saying that she
Will never SEQ him again until he
stops drinking. he turns away. and
! his shoulders seem to DO agatated
wit hsobs Of remorse. But when he
turns round It is seen to be a cock
tall that he is Shaking.
The Jester was tweaking the nose
OF love IND repentance and bringing
all the high ideals Off the shelf with
a bang. The audience, bullied a little
too well by trite nobi,ities. roared
with emancipation.