The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1924-12-19
THERE ARE FAIRIES.

Critics came back from the first
night of a revived Peter Pam
prey to sad musing. The glamour
of nearly 20 years ago was not to
be recaptured. Some think it is the
absence of Maude Adams, and that
very likely is true. Some think it
is the increment of nearly 20 years
in. the critics age; and that may,
in part, be true. For one thing
we must be grateful No one has
suggested that Peter Pan" was
bound to be void of appeal for a
generation that has lived hard in
the last 20 years and has lost its
faith in fairies. That is not true.
The belief in fairies, both good and
evil, in magic wands, in pirates, is
stronger today than it was at the
Empire theater in the year 1905.
And it is strongest among the
grownups.
Only the nomenclature has
changed. For Peter Pan we need
only say Peter Panacea and our
current faith in the supernatural is
established. Any number of people
today believe that you have only to
pronounce the proper incarnation
and the New Jerusalem will come
flying in through the window.
Some think a perfect world of
gingerbread, sweetmeats and end
less holidays can easily be invoked
by the red-garbed fairy known as
dictatorship of the Proletariat.
Some think that a world of per-
feet order and abundant prosperity
hes in the gift of a black-shirted
fairy named Mussolini.
Some of us were recently in the
habit of finding the reason and hope
for all things in a whiskered fairy
named Sigmund Freud.
The elfin host beats it's airy wings
around our heads like the spirits
around Faust. They are all there:
the Ku Klux fairy, the Vitamine
fairy, the Fifteen-Minutes-a-D
fairy, the Government Ownership
fairy, the Apple Week fairy, the
Cleanup Week fairy, the Eighteenth
Amendment fairy, the Censorship
fairy; of whom each one by itself
is fully competent to rebuild the
world according to the hearts de-
sire.
We believe in pirates, indeed we
90. We believe in international
flnanciers who put things over on
US, in wicked diplomats who bring
war upon US, in federal reserve
boards which debate US, in news
papers which deceive us, in secre-
taries of state who pilfer oil fields
in corrupt interests which jam up
the station at Times Square be-
tween 5 and p. m. And every
thing that is wrong with the world
is due entirely to these pirates and
lot in the least to our own inditfer-
enee or selfishness.
We believe in ogres, indeed we
do. We believe in Roman Catholics
who drill secretly in their cathedrals
for the overthrow of the republic,
in Jews and negroes who menace
the spirit of our institutions, an
numerous other COLLINS. kobolds,
bogies, trolls, jinns and afritas ex-
hibiting the wrong cephalic index.
The younger among US believe
ardently in Rabbit parentage de-
voted to money-making, eating its
soup noisily, and taking the Joy out
of life. The older among us be-
lieve just as faithfully in a young
er generation engaged in going to-
the devil by the gin and orange
Juice route.
Tinker Bell need never die.
Peter Panacea has only to step to
the footlights and make his appeal
for the Nordic civilization or for
Production-fof-U Instead-of- Pro
duction-for-P Profit, and the handker-
chiefs will flutter We believe in
fairies. Only today thev are dressed
as Formulas.-The New York Times.