Evening star., 1933-03-21

What mas 0ecOme OF Templet0n JoneS2
Inquiries as to the whereabouts Of
that astute gentleman are received
every time he vanishes from this page.
1t Is always q pleasure to reassure
readers as to his health, and to give
them the low down ON his movements.
Jones has been standing out in his
yard recently swearing roundly at .
flock Of starlings which daily attempts
to eat up all the freshly sown grass
seed
Since the seed was not put there for
the birds, Mr.. Jones thinks It rather
presumptuous OF them to partake Of It,
1t is heart-rending, Is 1t not. for q
gardener to watch his future lawn
slowly go down the gullets of assorted
fowl?
Somehow T. Jones always regarded
starlings as fowl, rather than simply
birds. they were so large, hefty and fat
Starlings were not the only creatures,
however, which insisted on taking . nip
at the Jonesian lawn grass seed
In addition to a pair of cardinals,
there were several bluejays, an assort-
ment of mocking birds and a few tiny
fellows with creSts on their heads.
Each bird seemed to scent the seed
from afar; it bounced. into the field Of
action like a famous athlete tuning up
before the fray.
Templeton Jones knew, from past ex-
perience, that birds do not eat as much
seed as they seem to be eating, which
was a helpful fact to keep In mind,
undoubtedly, but one which did little at
the time to aSSuage the feeling that
the entire lawn would be eaten away
by Sunday.
Hence Jones spent more minutes than
he would care to admit carefully shoo-
ing the birds away from his plot Of
ground
He did, at least. until he found it
was wasting time.
He would issue from the door noisily,
hoping that the slam Of the screen
would scare the feasters away
Sometimes 1t did, and sometimes 1t
didn't.
In the latter case, Jones would smack
his hands together in excellent imita-
tion Of thunder out OF China cross the
bay. whereupon the birds would fly up
into the highest tree and wait for him
to go indoors.
One particularly saucy starting, prob
ably the executive scout Of the gang,
would fly down before Jones got back
inside the house.
Then the flock would follow him, and
before our hero could get to the win
dow the birds would be busily eating
seed as II nothing had happened at all
And, perhaps, from their standpoint,
nothing had.
As T. Jones. esq. wandered around
his domain he noticed that the lily pool
needed cleaning out.
1t was filled with the withered leaves
Of the cattails, which last Summer grew
sturdily. and beyond all the Jonesian
expectations
Jones had envisioned q few cattails.
which. had they been but few, would
have given an exotic aspect to the
watery scene.
Growing luxuriantly, as they did, the
lily pool shortly became q cattail pool.
and so remained This plant, In its
various forms, sends out UNDERGROUND
runners. from which new plants spring
up. II they are to be used in q pool
and Jones says he cannot advise it
they should be planted in q pot In order
to prevent the runners from getting
cut.
A plant with similar habits, Wallis
neria, commonly called eel grass. is
familiar to the aquarist. Its runners
are sent out along the surface Of the
sand for q length OF two or three
inches; In sunny aquarium q series
OF plants will spring up. all linked
together. the newer ones quickly becom-
ing as tall as the parent plant.
Jones looked down at the withered