XXI
POTASH AND PERLMUTTER DISCUSS THE MAGAZINE IN WAR-TIMES
"I am just now reading an article by a feller which his name I couldn't remember, but he used to was a baseball-writer for the New York Moon," Abe Potash said, as he laid down one of the several weeklies that have the largest circulation in the United States.
"Is this a time to read about baseball?" Morris Perlmutter asked.
"What do you mean – baseball?" Abe demanded. "I said that the feller used to was a baseball-writer, but he is now a dramatic cricket."
"With me and dramatic crickets, Abe," Morris said, "it is always showless Tuesday, which when it comes to knocking plays, Abe, believe me, I don't need no assistance from nobody."
"Who said he is knocking plays, Mawruss?" Abe protested. "This here dramatic cricket has just returned from the western front, and he says that the way it looks now the war would last until – "
"Excuse me for interrupting you, Abe," Morris said, "but is there an article in that paper by a soldier which used to was a certified public accountant telling what is going to happen in the show business, because, if so, it might interest me, y'understand, but what a dramatic cricket who is also an ex-baseball-writer has got to say about the war, Abe, would only make me mad, Abe, because there is people writing about this war which really knows something about it, whereas as a general proposition it don't make no difference who writes about the show business, he usually don't know no more about it as, for example, a baseball-writer."
"That's where you make a big mistake, Mawruss," Abe said. "I have read articles about the war ever since the war started, and so far as I could see, Mawruss, the fellers which wrote them might just so well of stayed at home and got their dope from actors and baseball-players, because you take, for instance, the fellers which has written about conditions in Russland, Mawruss, and claims to have their information right on the spot from the Russian working-men and soldiers, y'understand, and from the way them fellers is all the time springing Nitchyvo! and Da! in their articles, Mawruss, it's a hundred-to-one proposition that them two words was all the Russian they was equipped with to carry on their conversations with them moujiks."
"For that matter, the fellers which writes the articles about the French end of the war don't seem to have had a nervous breakdown from studying French, neither," Morris observed. "All the French which them fellers puts into their writings is O.U.I., m'sieu, which don't look to me to be any more efficient as C.O.D., m'sieu, when it comes to finding out from a feller which speaks only French what he thinks about the war."
"Sure, I know," Abe agreed. "But a feller which writes such an article ain't aiming to tell what the French people thinks about the war. He is only writing what he thinks French people is thinking about the war; in fact, Mawruss, I've yet got to see the war article which contains as much information about the war and the people fighting in the war as about the feller which is writing the article, and the consequence is that after you put in a whole evening reading such an article you find that you've learned a lot of facts which might be of interest to the war correspondent's family provided he has sent them home money regularly every week and otherwise behaved to them in the past in such a manner that they give a nickel whether he comes back dead or alive."
"Of course there is exceptions, Abe," Morris said. "There is them articles which gives an account of the big battle where if the Allies would of only gone on fighting for one hour longer, Abe, they would of busted through the German line and the war would of been, so to speak, over."
"What big battle was that, Mawruss?" Abe asked.
"Practically every big battle which a war correspondent has written an article about since the war started," Morris replied, "and also while the article don't exactly say so, y'understand, it leads you to believe that if the feller which wrote it would of been running the battle, Abe, things would of been very different. Then again there is them articles which contains an account of just to prove how cool the English soldiers is, Abe, the war correspondent which wrote it heard about a private which had the hiccoughs during the heavy gunfire and asks some one to scare him so that he can cure his hiccoughs, which to me it don't prove so much how cool the English soldiers is as how some editors of magazines seemingly never go to moving-picture vaudeville shows."
"Editors 'ain't got no time for such nonsense, Mawruss," Abe said. "They got enough to keep 'em busy busheling the jobs them war correspondents turns in on them. Also, Mawruss, running a magazine in war-times ain't such a cinch, neither. Take in the old times before the war, and if a trunk railroad got wrecked, y'understand, people stayed interested long enough so that even if the article about how the head of the guilty banking concern worked his way up didn't appear till three months afterward, it was still good, but you take it to-day, Mawruss, and the chances is that a dozen articles about how Leon Trotzky used to was a feller by the name Braustein which are now slated to be put into the May edition of the magazine is going to be killed along with Trotzky somewheres about the middle of next month. In fact, Mawruss, things happen so thick and fast in this war that three months from now the only thing that people is going to remember about Brest-Litovsk and Galli-Curci will be the hyphens, and they won't be able to say offhand whether or not it was Brest-Litovsk that had the soprano voice or the peace conference."
"Well, if a magazine editor gets stumped for something to take the place of an article which went sour on him, Abe," Morris suggested, "he could always print a story about a beautiful lady spy, and usually does, y'understand, which the way them amateur spy-hunters gets their dope from reading magazines nowadays, Abe, if the magazines prints any more of them beautiful lady-spy stories, y'understand, a beautiful face on a lady is soon going to be as suspicious-looking as Heidelberg dueling scars on a man, and it's bound to have quite an adverse effect on the complexion-cream business."
"But you've got to hand it to these magazine editors, Mawruss," Abe said. "They ain't afraid to print articles which coppers the advertisements in the back pages. I am reading only this morning an article which it says on page twenty-eight of the magazine that people in Berlin is getting made Geheimeraths and having eagles hung on them by the Kaiser in all shades from red to Copenhagen blue for helping out Germany in this war by doing things that ain't one, two, six compared with what a feller in New York does when he buys a fifteen-hundred-dollar automobile, y'understand, and yet on pages thirty, thirty-two, thirty-eight, forty, and all the other pages from forty-one to fifty inclusive, the same magazine prints advertisements of automobiles costing from ten thousand dollars downwards, F.O.B. a freight-car in Detroit which should ought to be filled with ship-building material F.O.B. Newark, N.J."
"That ain't the magazine's fault, Abe," Morris said. "If it wasn't kept going by the money the advertisers pays for such advertisements it wouldn't be able to print them articles telling people it is unpatriotic to buy the automobiles which the advertisement says they should ought to buy."
"Maybe you're right," Abe said, "but in that case when a magazine prints an advertisement by the Charoses Motor Car Company that the new Charoses inclosed models in designs and luxury of appointment surpass the finest motor-carriages of this country and Europe, Mawruss, the editor should add in small letters, 'But see page twenty-eight of this magazine,' and then when the reader turns to page twenty-eight and finds out what the article says about pleasure cars in war-times, y'understand, he would think twice, ain't it?"
"Sure, I know," Morris said. "But there's always the danger that the advertiser would also turn to page twenty-eight, so as a business proposition for the magazine, it would be better if the editors stick to them nitchyvo articles, which if the advertisers turn to page twenty-eight and see one of those articles the only thing that would worry them, y'understand, is whether or not the reader is going to get so disgusted that he would throw away the magazine before he reached the advertising section."
"That ain't how I look at it, Mawruss," Abe protested. "The way a manufacturer has to figure costs so close nowadays, Mawruss, anything like these here war articles which gives you an example of how to turn out the finished product with the least amount of labor and material in it, Mawruss, should ought to be of great interest to the business man. For instance, you ask one of them live, up-to-date young fellers which is now writing about the war with such a good imitation of being right next to all the big diplomatic secrets that no one would ever suspect how before the war he used to think when he saw the word Gavour in the papers that it wasn't spelled right and cost a dollar fifty a portion with hard-boiled egg and chopped onions on the side, y'understand, and we'll say that such a feller is ordered by the magazine nebich which he works for to go and see Mr. Lloyd George and fill up pages twelve, thirteen, and fourteen of the April, nineteen seventeen, edition with what Lloyd George tells him about political conditions in Europe. Well, the first time he goes to Mr. Lloyd George's house we will say he gets kicked down the front stoop, on account when he says he represents the Interborough Magazine, the butler thinks he comes from the subscription department instead of the editorial department and didn't pay no attention to the sign 'No Canvassers Allowed on These Premises.' Do you suppose that feazes the young feller? Oser a Stück! He goes straight back home, paints the place where he landed with iodine, y'understand, and writes enough to fill up the whole of page twelve about how, unlike President Wilson, Mr. Lloyd George believes in surrounding himself with strong men. The next time he calls there he gets into the front parlor while he sends up his card, and before the butler could return with the message that Mr. Lloyd George says he wouldn't be back for some days, y'understand, Mrs. Lloyd George happens in and wants to know who let him in there and he should go and wait outside in the vestibule, which is good for half a page of how Mr. Lloyd George's success in politics is due in great measure to the tact and diplomacy of his charming wife.
"However, he has still got half of page thirteen and all of page fourteen to fill up, and the next day he lays for Mr. Lloyd George at the corner of the street and walks along beside him while he tells him he represents the Interborough Magazine, which on account of the young feller's American accent Mr. Lloyd George gets the idee at first that he is being asked for the price of a night's lodging, y'understand. So he tells the young feller that he should ought to be ashamed not to be fighting for his country. This brings them to the front door, and when Mr. Lloyd George at last finds out what the young feller really wants, understand me, he says, 'I 'ain't got no time to talk to you now,' which is practically everything the young feller needs to finish up his article.
"He sits up all night and writes a full account, as nearly as he could remember it, not having taken no notes at the time, of just what Mr. Lloyd George said about the 'Youth of the country and universal military service,' y'understand, and also how Mr. Lloyd George spoke at some length of the Cabinet Minister's life in war-times and what little opportunity it gave for meeting and conversing with friends, quoting Mr. Lloyd George's very words, which were, as the young feller distinctly recalled, 'Much as I would like to do so, I find myself quite unable to speak even to you at any greater length,' and that's the way them articles is written, Mawruss."
"I wonder how big the article would of been, supposing the young feller had really and truly talked to Mr. Lloyd George for, say, three to five minutes, Abe," Morris said.
"Then the article wouldn't have been an article no more, Mawruss," Abe concluded. "It would of been a book of four hundred pages by the name: Lloyd George, The Cabinet Minister and the Man. Price, two dollars net."
XXII
POTASH AND PERLMUTTER ON SAVING DAYLIGHT, COAL, AND BREATH
"It ain't a bad scheme at that, Mawruss," Abe Potash said as he laid down the paper which contained an editorial on daylight-saving. "The idee is to get a law passed by the legislature setting the clock ahead one hour in summer-time and get the advantage of the sun rising earlier and setting later so that you don't have to use so much electric light and gas, y'understand, because it's an old saying and a true one, Mawruss, that the sunshine's free for everybody."
"Except the feller in the raincoat business," Morris Perlmutter added.
"Also, Mawruss," Abe continued, evading the interruption, "there's a whole lot of people which 'ain't got enough will power to get up until their folks knock at the door and say it is half past seven and are they going to lay in bed all day, y'understand, which in reality when the clocks are set ahead, Mawruss, it would be only half past six."
"But don't you suppose that lazy people read the newspapers the same like anybody else, Abe?" Morris asked. "Them fellers would know just as good as the people which is trying to wake them up that it is only half past six under Section Two A of Chapter Five Fourteen of the Laws of Nineteen Eighteen entitled 'An Act to Save Daylight in the State of New York for Cities of the First, Second, and Third Classes,' y'understand, and they will turn right over and go on sleeping until eight o'clock, old style, which is two hours after the sun is scheduled to rise in the almanacs published by Kidney Remedy companies from information furnished by the United States government in Washington."
"Of course, Mawruss, I ain't such a big philosopher like you, y'understand," Abe said, "but so far as I could see it ain't going to do a bit of harm if you could get down-town one hour earlier in the summer-time, even though it is going to take an act of the legislature to do it."
"And it would also be a good thing if the legislature would pass an act making a half an hour for lunch thirty minutes long instead of ninety minutes, the way some people has got into the habit of figuring it, Abe," Morris retorted, "but, anyhow, that ain't here nor there. This is a republic, Abe, and if the people wants to kid themselves by putting the clock ahead instead of getting up earlier, Mawruss, the government could easy oblige them, y'understand, but not even the Kaiser and all his generals could make a law that would change the sun from being right straight overhead at twelve o'clock noon, Abe."
"Don't worry about the sun, Mawruss," Abe said. "The sun would stay on the job, war-times or no war-times. Nobody is trying to make laws to kid the sun into getting to work any earlier, Mawruss, but even with this war as an argument, there's a whole lot of people which would be foolish enough to claim pay for a time and a half for the first hour they worked if you was to alter your office hours so that they had to come down-town at seven instead of eight, although you did let them go home an hour earlier in the afternoon."
"Maybe they would," Morris said, "but it seems to me, Abe, that a great deal of time and money is wasted by legislatures making laws for unreasonable people. For instance, if you change the clocks to save time where are you going to stop? The next thing you know the legislature would be trying to save coal by changing the thermometer in winter so that the freezing-point from December first to March first would be forty-five degrees Fahrenheit, and then when people living in houses situated in cities of the first, second, and third classes kept their houses up to a sixty-eight-degree new style, which was fifty-five degrees old style, they would be feeling perfectly comfortable under the statue in such case made and provided. Also legislatures would be making laws for the period of the sugar shortage, changing the dials on spring scales by bringing the pounds closer together, so that a pound of sugar would contain sixteen ounces new style, being equivalent to twelve ounces old style."
"It ain't a bad idea at that, Mawruss," Abe said.
"It wouldn't be if the same law provided for changing the size of teaspoons and cups, Abe," Morris said, "and even then there is no way of trusting a bowl of sugar to a sugar hog in the hopes that he wouldn't help himself to four or five spoonfuls, new style, being the equivalent of the three spoonfuls such a Chozzer used to be put into his coffee before the passage of the sugar-spoon law, supposing there was such a law."
"Sure, I know," Abe said. "But daylight is different from sugar. The idea is that people should use more of it, Mawruss."
"I am willing," Morris said; "but so far as I could see, there ain't going to be no more daylight after the law goes into effect than there was before, and as for setting the clock one hour ahead, anybody could do that for himself without the legislature passing a law about it."
"Say!" Abe protested. "Legislators don't get paid piece-work. They draw an annual salary, Mawruss; so if they went to pass a law about it, let them do a little something to earn their wages, Mawruss."
"Don't worry about them fellers not earning their wages, Abe," Morris said. "Legislators is like actors, so long as they got their names in the papers they don't care how hard they work, which if you was to allow them fellers to regulate the hours of daylight by legislation, Abe, so as to encourage lazy people to get up earlier, Abe, the first thing you know, so as to encourage aviators to fly higher, they would be passing an act suspending the laws of gravity for the period of the war."
"Well, I believe in that, too, Mawruss," Abe said. "Time enough we should have laws of gravity when we need them, but what is the use going round with a long face before we actually have something to pull a long face over? Am I right or wrong, Mawruss?"
"Tell me, Abe," Morris asked, "what do you think the laws of gravity is, anyhow? No Sunday baseball or something?"
"Well, ain't it?" Abe demanded.
"So that's your idee of the laws of gravity," Morris exclaimed.
"Say!" Abe retorted. "When I got a partner which is a combination of John G. Stanchfield, Judge Brandeis, and the feller what wrote Hamafteach, I should worry if I don't know every law in the law-books; so go ahead, Mawruss, I'm listening. What is the laws of gravity?"
"The laws of gravity is this," Morris explained. "If you would throw a ball up in the air, why does it come down?"
"Because I couldn't perform miracles exactly," Abe replied, promptly.
"Neither could the legislature and also President Wilson," Morris said, "because even though you would understand the laws of gravity, which you don't, the baseball comes down according to the laws of gravity, and even though Mr. Wilson does understand the laws of supply and demand, y'understand, if he gets busy and sets a low price on coal, potatoes, wheat, or anything else that people is working to produce for a living and not for the exercise there is in it, y'understand, such people would leave off producing it and go into some other line where the prices ain't regulated."
"They would be suckers if they didn't," Abe commented.
"And the consequence would be that sooner or later, on account of such low prices, y'understand, everybody would have the price, but nobody would have the coal," Morris said, "and that is what is called the law of supply and demand. It ain't a law which was passed by any legislature, Abe. It's a law which made itself, like the law that if you eat too much you'll get stomach trouble, and if you spend too much you'll go broke, and you couldn't sidestep any of them self-made laws by consulting those high-grade crooks which used to specialize in getting million-dollar fees out of finding loopholes in the Interstate Commerce law and the Anti-trust laws, because there's no loopholes in the law of supply and demand."
"Might there ain't no loopholes in the law of supply and demand, maybe," Abe said; "but when Mr. Wilson gave the order to his Coal Administrator to lower the price of coal it's my idee that he was trying to punch a few loopholes in the law of The Public Be Damned, which while it was never passed by no legislature, Mawruss, it ain't self-made, neither, y'understand, but was made by the producer to do away with this here law of gravity, because under the law of The Public Be Damned prices goes up and they never come down, but they keep on going up and up according to that other law, the law of the Sky's the Limit, which no doubt a big philosopher like you, Mawruss, has heard about already."
"In the company of igneramuses, Abe," Morris said, "a feller could easy get a reputation for being a big philosopher, and not know such an awful lot at that."
"I give you right, Mawruss," Abe agreed, heartily; "but even admitting that you don't know an awful lot, Mawruss, there's something in what you say about this here law of supply and demand."
"Well, now that you indorse it, Abe, that makes it, anyhow, an argument," Morris commented.
"But it looks to me like one of them arguments that is pulled by the supply end to put something over on the demand end," Abe continued, "because President Wilson knows just so much about the law of supply and demand as the coal operators does, Mawruss, and when he fixed the price of coal you could bet your life, Mawruss, he made it an even break for the supply people as well as for the demand people."
"And what has all this got to do with setting the clock ahead one hour in summer, Abe, which was what you was talking about in the first place?" Morris demanded.
"Nothing, except that setting the clock ahead so as to save bills for gas and electric light and limiting the price of coal so as the public couldn't be gouged by the coal operators, so far as I could see, is two dead open and shut propositions, Mawruss," Abe said, "which of course I admit that I'm an ignorant man and don't know no more laws than a police-court lawyer, y'understand, but at the same time, Mawruss, I must got to say the way it looks to me it ain't the ignorant men which is blocking the speed of this war. For instance, who is it when Mr. Hoover wants to have millions of bushels wheat by using whole-wheat bread that says whole-wheat bread irritates the lining from the elementry canal? The ignorant man? Oser! He don't know the elementry canal from the Panama Canal, and if he did he couldn't tell you whether elementry canals came lined with Skinner's satin or mohair or just plain unlined with the seams felled. Then, again, who is it that when any order is made by the government which is meant to help along the war takes it like a personal insult direct from Mr. Wilson? The ignorant man? No, Mawruss, it's the feller which thinks that what's the use of having an education if you couldn't seize every opportunity of putting up an argument and using all the long words you've got in your system."
"All right, Abe," Morris said. "I'm converted. Rather as sit here and waste the whole morning I'm content that you should pass a law saving daylight if you want to."
"Don't do me no favors, Mawruss," Abe commented.
"And while you're about it, Abe," Morris concluded, "if you couldn't save it otherwise, have the legislature pass another law that people should save something else for the duration of the war which they ordinarily couldn't live without."
"What's that?" Abe asked.
"Breath," Morris said.