Vagabond Editorials

By Jack Dionne

Letters of unusual character are always a joy. I havc a file of them almost as old and precious as my file of favorite stories. Got one the other day that was a genL ft was from a man who is fighting "T. B.' in Arizona, and was a "thank you" letter on receipt of my new story book, "Lotsa" Fun. FIe wrote: "I busted one of my lungs back in 1932, and I am damn near busted the other one the other day when I started reading your new book 'Lotsa' Fun. I'm going to pass it around to these 'lungers' here and it will either kill or cure them, and in either case will be a blessing." That was my idea of a splendid testimonial. My friend, James Swinnerton, once a "lunger," always claims that a successful fight against tuberculosis is invariably based on a good sense of humor. **rt tFtrt

Speaking of letters, I had some grand ones about my recent editorial regarding King George and Kipling. Lovers of Kipling, like my friend, H. E. Veness, of Portland, Oregon, and Mrs. Harry Deffebach, of Houston, Texas, almost brought blushes to my cheeks with their kindly enthusiasm. Mrs. Deffebach wants that suggestion that we make this a "Read Kipling" year to be nationalized.

Another letter from a lumber lady who wrote to tell me of a funny bust she recently made. A man phoned her home and asked for her husband. He was out. "May I take the message?" asked the lady. "Sure," said the voice at the other end, "tell him that car of white pine is spotted." And when her husband came home she related to him, with deep concern, that someone had called to complain that "the car of white pine is all spotted." That ..all,' made a difference.

Well, old George Bernard Shaw is with us again. What a tough break for a country that is just getting over five years of other miseries'! What have we done to deserve occasional visits from that old monstrosity? Irvin Cobb wrote in his column the other day that he had changed his mind about Shaw and now thinks he's a pretty lousy old rascal. I didn't have to change my mind about George Bernard. f started out thinking about him what Cobb thinks now, and my opinion has been getting worse ever since. **!t

I've explained in this column before how the impression got around that Shaw was a genius. His literary tech- nique was to twist trick words into trick phrases, throw them together on the willy-nilly and helter-skelter plan, and put a title over them. Then all the dim-wits of the world, reading the junk and seeing no sense to what they read (like our phony appraisers of modernistic art) immediately arrived at thFto them-happy conclusion that the author of the pied pamphlet must be a genius. And that's how the silly chatter started.

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Just about the time it looks as though we were getting entirely over this long-winded depression, sornething else comes along to depress us. This time it's George Bernard. Let us hope he won't stay long. :1. ,t *

What tickles me is that I meet a man every day or so now who seems to think it is simply wonderful that we are coming out of the depression, that business and everything is getting continually better. I don't think this doggoned trouble has seemed any longer to anyone than it has to me, but- f've always known we'd come out of it, for the simple reason that there is nothing unnatural or even unusual about the dark cloud we have been going through; humanity has been suffering with such at fairly regular intervals ever since time began. There have been times when I wondered whether I would come out of it, but I always knew that WE would.

\Jl/e've always "o-" orrJorirrJ* before. And the history of panics and depressions shows that they are invariably followed by a high tide of prosperity, the wave swinging high in about the same ratio that it swung low. But they always end. Some of them are longer than others, but regardless of what troubled man does about themo they always HAVE come to an end. And there is always a high tide of better times following on their departing footsteps. You can't stop that, either. Personally, I'm willing this one should swing as high as it pleases.

But it is worth ,.*"rrrulrirlg ft ", u""r, shining as a star of hope for me for five long years)-that these great panics and depressions have been among the apparently inevitable curses of mankind since civilization began; that during the two hundred odd years of our national life in this country they have occurred with rhythmic regularity, being apparently part and parcel of the price that mankind pays for this thing we call civilization. We have always had 'em.

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