Evening star., 1934-09-16
Tales of Well-KnOWn Folk
I'm Art, Literature, Politics
Mrs. Roosevelt No Quibbler at Form-Senate
Investigating Committee Gives Thrills.
Interesting New Books.

dazzling chandeliers. More the ef-
feet of ball room. Draperies at the
windows, red velvet carpet and ele-
CANT gadgets of all kinds. Corre-
spondents and reporters everywhere.
Senate secretaries and clerks, mar
celled Sten0gS, dressed quite en-
tailleure, hovered near their several
employers. Tourists wondering what
it was all about.
1t looks as If that charming Mrs.
Isabella Greenway-she of the fluffy
hair-who represents Arizona and
who succeeded Mr.. Lewis Douglas,
sometime director of the budget, as
the lone Representative in Congress
from that State, will be returned to
the House this Fall. An alluring per-
son, steady in her convictions and a
success in Congress. Mr.. Douglas did
not choose to run-he's indigenous to
the soil out there; Mrs. Greenway is
transplanted, but has gone native.
What has the former director of the
budget in mind? There are other
worlds to conquer.
There has been since the beginning
of the world man of mystery"
The title is exciting and stimulates
the imagination. Sir Basil zaharoff's
name came into the picture several
times the other day during the Sen
ate investigation, and a young pri-
vate secretary asked. who ne was?
He had not heard of him before
all the furry But reams have
been written since about the mys-
terry man of Europe, who like
will o. the wisp has fitted over the
world-and is as much of mystery
today as when the recent publicity
began. Like the author Of immortal
Iliad and Odyssey, his place OF
birth is not established. Many places
seem proud to claim him. But there
is one fact that appears to be es-
tablished: He was baptized zacar-
ria-and the two rs are interviewer
on the iron gates of his Paris hotel
or house. 1t is not related when the
name Basil was first used. AS in
teresting as Monte Crist3.
The celebration Of the centenary of
Whistlers birth is over, but the Lon
don papers are still agitating the place
and time of his advent into the world.
Mr.. Whistler testified at the famous
Whistler -Ruskin trial in London in
1878 that he was born in st. Peters
burg, Russia. Some delightful things
are again brought out.
A former parlor maid Of the great
artist writes: "I was about % when
I entered his service, and was suffl-
GENTLY simple to ask the cook about
the old lady who looked so sweet and
kind, but who never moved when I
was shown the dining room The cook,
who came in daily, laughed much at
my mistake when she told me that it
was the portrait of his mother"
At that time Whistler's passion for
painting butterflies must have been at
its height, for the maid relates: "Mr.
and Mrs. Whistler's room was very
pretty, the whole effect was white with
beautiful butterflies painted here and
there on everything. Mr.. Whistler set
all the house linen and his own per-
sonal linen marked with them" In
the peacock room in the Freer Gallery.
this emblem or device is shown.
Sir Richard Steele, just Dick"
through the centuries since he lived
and died. The lovable, brilliant, ag-
slippery Irish dramatist.
editor of the Tatler, and the fascinat-
ing hero of the seventeenth and eight
eenth centuries. Women worshiped
him and men loved him. He de-
claimed the verses Of Addison In
way that helped to make them i'm
mortal.
Mr.. Willard Connely's "Sir Richard
Steele" at last published in this coun-
try, after five years devoted to the
task-no, it's pleasure, of putting on
the written page this brilliant essayist
who was often sore trial to the
quieter more elegant Mr.. Addison, but
who loved to work with him.
"Prue," his much-mistreated wife,
who was often his inspiration to work
and of whom Sir Richard said, when
she was buried in Westminster Abbey,
Our love not to be excelled in the
mansions of eternity" He had led
her dogs life-sometimes she had to
leave him, but always returned. The
servants were seldom paid and the
debts were mountainous. The anus
ing story of the bailiffs entering his
house to collect a debt and being
dressed up in livery to serve at table
for distinguished company was only
one of the many subterfuges practiced
by him to extricate himself from an
situation. Mr.. Connely
has done real service to an oft-times
book-weary public.
Cape Farwell," by Mr.. Harry Mar
seems to have come out at
4 very happy time-the international
yacht races, the finish, when the
sporting world is all agog and the
seas the thing. 1t appears that the
story is a true one of the authors
adventures on the seven seas. Why
does one always get mixed up about
the seven seas?
Carl Van Doren'S Modern Ameri-
can Prose" includes a miscellaneous
Time to Re.Wave with a