V.gabond Editorials

By Jack Dionne

The clouds of depression are lifting. Everywhere. Every day. Stocks go up; and what was guestion mark, becomes an asset. Bonds go up; and the paper they are attached to as collateral become sound again. Cotton goes up; and one-third of the nation feels millions slipping into their pockets. Cattle, hogs, wheat, commodities of every sort, Bo up, and people begin to buy on the rise, just as they have always done. Every irnprovement brings others. The fabric from which prosperity is being created is interwoven of all business.

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More lumber is being bought in the country today than any time in three years. Not in great gobs. But everywhere there is a movement and a stirring. No one has any lumber in the distribution end of the lumber industrynationally speaking. So they all get in and buy a littlesome a lot. And the barometer of business creeps steadily upward. Everyone feels it; everyone tingles with it; and their optimism is another strengthening influence.

"rt's artificial," cries ; ;r:-rst. "rt's political manipulation," cries anpther. Foolish words ! What difrerence does it make, so long as it turns over our motor and starts it running? The very thing that you do when you turn on your switch and touch your toe to the starter of your car, is being done today in business. As your motor stands idle the motive power is all there. You have to apply the artificial stimulus of the start€r to turn it over and get it going. You don't have to keep your toe on the starter after the motor gets going.

As I write a bond salesman sits grinning at my elbow. "'W'e have more calls for bonds today than we have had in any entire .month since 1930," he says. You can't tell HIM that we aien't climbing the hill. He says that men who used to.slam the door when they saw him coming in, are asking him today-"What have you got?"

Millions of men are going back to work in the next few weeks. Already I meet people on the street who grinningly say-"I've had my pay raised." Nothing like that has happened in a long time, but it's happening now. The mer- chants everywhere sense the change. They are raising prices. Go into your chain drug store and find out the comparative prices of standard articles today and thirty days ago. It will surprise you. Those chain store birds are a good barometer. They have raised innumerable articles as much as twenty-five per cent-and selling them.

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The way money comes bubbling forth is impressive. And people will come out of their "huddling" in the same fashion as the upward tide develops. Don't doubt. Believe. And help. But whether you doubt, believe, or help-we are nevertheless climbing the hill today. Soon there will be no room for doubt.

**:t t*{< rF ,F ,* l'There is hardly a vestige of conversation, left in America," writes a famous English critic. Say ! What is this guy -a bachelor?

Coca Cola announces that it has "no saturation point." Huh! Didja ever spill one in your lap?

A middle western co,ncern sold two million dollars worth of hamburgers in 1931. Goes to prove that the eternal grind will bring fortune-if not fame.

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A friend of mine sends me in a new word:

BOOKSNEAF-A person who habitually borrows books from friends. A victim of the pernicious habit of carrying away books from homes-libraries-of friends-and even casual acquaintances.

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I heard a very interesting college professor talk educatiorl the other day. But he wasn't academic. He said that college teaches a young man two things, and if he learns thosti two fundamentals, he is .educated. First, it teaches hirn to live with other rnen. Second, it teaches him to think. Check, Professor ! You've done said it alt !

He wouldn't go out to meet it, like lots of wise men told him he should. He just waited patiently for his ship to come in; and when it came, it was a receiver-ship.

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