The Key West citizen. [volume] (Key West, Fla.) 1879-current, 1951-11-10
Key West High School Band AT A Practice Session

mysterious regions have been H.
Illuminated with floodlights. am
plifying microphones eavesdrop
on the souls whispered CONVEX
stations: love is filmed for the
newsreels SO that Conrade Ev-
eryman may have look at these
/ things after his days work is
done the employee of the
state, whether he serves the
monster switchboard of the bu-
reaucracy or the machine itself,
is subject to a painfully close in
spection of body and soul to in
sure that he is not harboring any
unauthorized personality traits
during a single night shift
Granyas the kulak's daughter,
natures under the neon moon
into a self-confidant comrade."
And as the book closes Walter
Mehring makes this condemnation
of the stupidity prevailing in the
New Order in Europe today:
And when the Spirit of the
Nineteenth Century creeps back
to earth by night, a restless ghost,
driven by his hunger for read
ing. knowledge and culture, he
finds nothing left of his library
but heap of spIintered shelves,
erumpled volumes with the bind
ings torn off, dirtied. half-char-
red proof sheets, tattered rem
nants of literary and scientific
magazines, letters from publish
ers, complaints from writers, un-
finished manuscripts. photo
graphs, love letters, broken dish
es, smashed vases, shaving brush
eS, cigarette butts, broken records
of Scarlatti, Bach, DebuSsy and
Flamencodances, spilled ink and
red wine-ail the sweepings that
a New Order produces"
c'Fsll of the Sparrow" bv jaw
Williams, fiction. published
by Oxford University Press. New
York City. l5s pages.)
The toy key deer made their
debut in print in the Key West
Citizen long ago. Then they NOV
/ ed on to newspapers of larger
! circulation, and into national
magazines. They have been faith
cred by local Audubon societies
and government departments,
they have been the subject OF
dull and passionate lectures on
the subject of extinction versus
preservation. And now they are
between the covers of this new
book, highlighted in the second
paragraph.
And why has the toy deer at
tanned this distinction? Not be-
cause he Is a rare pretty thing
with a great delicacy and Bambi
eyes, but because he is threaten
ed with extinction.
And this new book is about
the species and subspecies of
mammals which have disappear
ed from the earth, most of
them as a result of mans depre-
dations or meddling."
Interesting bits of information
about the relations between men
and animals are scattered all
through the slender volume. The
mamo, for example, was wiped
out because its golden back fea-
theirs made stunning royal cloaks
for Hawaiian kings, md elk's
upper canine teeth made excell-
ent watch charms in the estima-
ton of the Benevolent and Pro-
tective Order of Elks,
The pocarana, a giant South
American rat almost as large as
a beaver, lost out to man because
1t liked to waddle up to man to
have its back scratched. The last
passenger pigeon, died of old age
in the Cincinnati Geological Gar
den on September |, 1915 at S
p. m. surrounded by hushed
group of distinguished orintho-
ologiSts."
The now extinct solitaire bird
when caught would shed tears
without crying and refuse all
manner of sustenance until he
died Animals who live in trees
sometimes fall out and are killed
in the fall An important reason
for the Sea-cow's disappearance
was his compassion. When one of
his crowd was hurt or shot the
others hung around nuzzling it,
which provided hunters with
the opportunity to kill as many
as they pleased at their leisure.
The euphonious word kitchen
hidden means a pile of old bones
Of birds and beasts Ieaten by
man, sort OF yesterdays garb-
age pail fossiiized. Ii was not UNI
usual for trains on the Atchison,
Topeka and Santa Fe to be stop