The Polk County post., January 21, 1921, Image 3

H ow It Looks
N o w in France
* ---------------------------------------------------------
There Is Not Much Change Ex
cept in the Spaces Between
the Villages.
tailed girls and black-smocked boys
declaiming the fact that the Amazon
Is a river in l'Amerique du Sud or that
Ceylon is an Island where the tea
comes from.
SHOWS HAVOC UNDISTURBED
Laboring with them patiently, his
brow furrowed by his sense o f the
time that has been lost, you see a
fatherly young Frenchman. I’erhaps
he was a corporal at Verdun when the
armistice was signed.
As the American in France sees all
School in a B arracks.
T h e S oldier W h o Goes Back to H is
D ugout in the W oods Is L ik e ly to
F in d T h a t O n ly the Rains
H a ve Reshaped It.
New York.—To any American com­
ing back from France these days, the
first greeting from a quondam mem­
ber of the A. E. F. is always thisu
“ Well, how’s it look over there?
Changed much?”
To which, ufter some futile short­
lived notion of describing the great
mutilated stretch o f France, with its
million discouragements and its thou­
sand and one evidences of renewing
life, the returning wanderer must
needs answer:
“ No, not much."
For the impression that the old bat­
tlefields make Is of havoc undisturbed,
paralysis unctired, Alexander Wooll-
cott writes in the North American
Review. The soldier who goes back
to his old dugout in the woods near
Grand I’re Is likely to find that only
the steady rains have reshaped it, that
the old helmet the shell-hit blew from
his head still lies where It fell two
years ngo and more. The villages of
the Meuse, the Ourcq, the Yesie und
the Aisne look much ns they did when
the American troops trudged out of
them for the last time. It is true that
the rubble Is gone from the streets,
and the litter of stone has been re­
duced to neat piles of assorted pieces.
Here and there a rough new cottnge
has been fashioned from the materials
o f its demolished predecessor. At in­
tervals there are unfamiliar shacks
and barracks. But on the whole, Mont-
faucon and Fere-en-Tardenois and Ju­
vigny— they all look much ns they did
when the Yanks started home. Vaux
that little Marne village which the ar­
tillery behind the ninth infantry blew
to bits in the excitement o f June, 1918
— Vaux has only one new building. It
is not much of a building at that—just
a shack of wood and tarpaper. And
it is not a dwelling at all. It is a
buvette.
W h ere
Im provem ents A re
Seen.
It is in the spaces between the vil­
lages that the change is so remark­
able. You see it even in the rolling
land of the Argonne and the blasted
countryside of the Chemin-des-Dames.
For almost everywhere some tilling
has been done.
Visitors to the American graves near
Juvigny in the spring of 1919 marveled
to find that the old quarries along
the ravine on the side o f the town,
which had once served as divisional
headquarters, message centers nnd
dugouts in time of buttle, were then
serving as homes for the first six of
the returning families, so that children
were playing with the useless gas
masks out in front while Spartan
perce-nelges bloomed at cave en­
trances and the week’s wash flapped
in the wind.
Now another winter and another
summer have gone by. The fields near­
by have been largely cleared of their
wire and shells and have yielded some
food and a little Income to Juvigny.
I’erhaps 200 people are back in the
town.
It is because o f this scantiness of
reconstruction as far as home build­
ing goes that, ns you walk along a
ruined street, Juvigny seems a de­
serted city. But it is hardly that and
you realize as much with something
o f a thrill when ill a clearing amid
the rubble, you come upon a barrack
nnd catch through the windows the
unmistaknhle drone of childish voices.
It is a school nnd a glance through
the window shows row on row of pig­
the preposterous u m . ......
In force, he tlmls himself thinking o f
pleasant suburbs back In America,
comfortable, well fed America, of tidy
lawns and children romping off to
school, o f country clubs and poker
games and silk stockings und squan­
dered wealth. And o f people who sa y :
“Oh, forget about the war." And he
begins to feel a certain tingling re­
sentment at America.
But then the train wheezes into
I’nrls and Ills taxi whirls hint away to
boulevards all gay with bustling peo­
ple and restaurants with groaning ta­
bles and such food and drink ax only
the Old World knows. He sees luxury
and ease and extravagance on every
side and he realizes then that all the
selfishness and forgetfulness in the
world Is not American.
Uncle Sam’s Oil Refinery at Arlington
SHELLED BY ACCIDENT
Sobs as He Tells of
Son Taking Fortune
Montreal, Que.— A tragic story
of a father’s misplaced confi­
dence which enabled Ills son to
wreck the family fortune during
his absence abroad was bared on
the witness stand before Justice
McLennan in Superior court by
C. II. Cahan, K. C., one of
Canada’s
most
distinguished
lawyers.
The witness burst Into tenrs
when he told how he had con­
ferred power of attorney on his
son, C. II. Cahan, Jr., trusting
him absolutely to carry on his
affairs while on a European trip,
and returning home only to dis­
cover that he had been betrayed;
that his son had absconded and
the family fortune had been
wiped out.
The remarkable case was re­
vealed through a suit brought by
the Corporation Agencies, Limit­
ed, against the Home Bank of
Canada to recover $209,028, the
alleged defalcations o f the son.
The legal Issue rests on whether
the bank can be held to make
good the amount.
The government operates a complete refinery at the experiment farm of the United States Department of Ag­
riculture. Arlington. The equipment was designed by the bureau of public roads for studying methods of treatnent
and characteristics of crude petroleum used In building and maintaining highways. The oils from the wells la
California, Texas and Mexico, are analyzed with the view of determining their relative road-building values.
Strange Malady
.
Sweeping Haiti :
Doctors Unable to Discover the
Source of Most Baffling and
Fatal of Diseases.
During the spectacular fire on an
ammunition barge at Fort Hamilton,
a 10-lnch shell crashed through the
wall o f a house a mile away and
plunged down to the cellar.
Fortu­
nately the family were all out watch­
ing the fire.
Use of Forests Is
Increasing in U. S.
National Reserves Becoming Rec­
reation Grounds for Campers
and Summer Residents.
reationnl settlements within the An­
geles forest will pay the entire cost
o f protection and administration.
Many western communities are rec­
ognizing the recreational resources of
nearby national forests as one of th r
greatest assets and privileges, Col.
Greeley says, nnd are establishing com­
munity camps under more or less for­
mal organization.
WHITE POPULATION IMMUNE
A ilm e n t T h a t K ills 20,000 N ative s
E v e ry Y e a r S tarts in the Feet
and Spreads U p w a rd , the
Body Becoming Sw ollen.
Port-au-rrince, Haiti.—The Ameri­
can occupation of Haiti has served to
direct medical research into one of the
most baffling and perhaps fatal mala­
dies known to modern medicine.
Haiti Is a lund o f 2,000,000 people.
The most conservative estimate, bused
on 12 months of historical research
into Haiti’s mysterious disease, is
that a million Haitians have suc­
cumbed to the malady in the last 50
years.
Here where native productiv­
ity is truly synonymous with extrava­
gant tropical verdure, a death rate of
20,000 n year, or nearly 1,700 a month,
has not served to worry the nationals.
For the last five years American
medical officers have noticed that
lower caste Hnltians, sent to prison,
develop an nlanulng condition there
nnd die nt n rate of from 50 to 00 per
cent o f those affected.
Only during the last 12 months have
the causes and effects o f these alarm­
ing deaths been studied and recog­
nized as a separate disease. The dis­
covery was made a year ago by Dr. W.
L. Mann, surgeon of the United States
navy, a native of Austin, Tex., whose
naval rank Is that of lieutenant com­
mander, supervising the entire medi­
cal department of the American-con­
trolled Gendnrmerle d'Halti.
Dr. Mann Is a graduate of Harvard
medical school, holder o f several col­
lege degrees nnd has spent the major
part o f his time In tropical nnd sub­
tropical countries.
Ills writings on
pn-ventive medicine nnd tropical dis­
ease and long experience equipped him
to point out this mysterious disease
soon after his arrival In Haiti.
then, without wnrnlng, full In u faint
and gradually expire.
Though the grouping o f Haitian ne­
groes In prisons called Doctor Mann's
attention to the disease, he Is reason­
ably certain that It Is not due to con­
finement, ns In some prisons the mal­
ady Is entirely absent. Before the ad­
vent of Americans In Haiti the pris­
ons were quagmires where prisoners
were thrown to subsist on foovl smug­
gled In by relatives or starve. Today,
under American supervision, the pris­
ons nre models of clennliness, hut sani­
tation has not served to eradicate the
mysterious disease. Infection almost
has been eliminated by research as
the enuse.
Imprisonment possibly
aids the malady, but It Is not entirely
responsible, ns numerous nntives who
never saw a prison succumb.
Re­
search brought the possible cause to
the question of faulty diet, especially
In prisons. On this question Doctor
Mann was noncommittal. As he ex­
pressed It: “ The evidence accumulated
up to the present date regarding diet
ns a factor Is conflicting and uncon­
vincing. Diet may or may not be at
fault, nnd I am not prepared to ex­
press a definite opinion on this sub­
ject.”
Man Keeps Green
Prospective Grave
New Carlisle, Pa.—There’s a
newly-made grave in New Car­
♦
lisle cemetery.
No mourners with bowed
heads stood by when It was
made. No minister said “ earth
to earth and dust to dust.” No
flowers bedecked the casket.
Rut the man who will rest In
the grave some day carefully
heaped up the little mound nnd
I ns cnrefully placed the little
squares o f sod In place. The
grave Is empty—waiting until
denth lays Its hand on the man
who prepared It.
J. Herwert Day, 50 years old,
well known citizen nnd music
teacher, being the last member
of his family, ordered the care­
taker to prepare the grave, con­
struct the stone vault for receiv­
ing the casket, place the broad
stone over It nnd refill the grave.
This was done, after which Day
himself heaped up “ the little
mound o f clay,” nnd plueed the
sod upon It.
i
:
j
I
ordinary Haitian diet.
Experiments
to date have given no conclusive an­
swer.
The Institutional Incidence of the
Haitian disease or Its tendency to ap­
pear In epidemic form and to nffect
M any Leads Developed.
N o Charge to P ublic.
Income Prom ises to Be Im portan t
certain Institutions, suggested the na­
The
picnic
camps
nre
Improved
by
Dr.
Mann's
researches
have
devel­
Source of Revenue to the United
ture o f an Infective agent. At one
the construction o f fireplaces, rustic
oped many lends, but when one theory
States— S pecially T ra in e d Men
time the bedbug was under suspicion.
tables nnd seats, nnd nre made avail­
seems to have given the greatest en­
Needed In Service.
Numerous blood cultures nnd cultures
able to the public without any charge.
couragement It Is destroyed.
from autopslcnl finds, nnlinnl Inocula­
Symptoms of the disease would seem
Washington.—That the use o f the The vacation camps under municipal
tion nnd the like, hnve produced only
to bring It nearer to berl-beri than nny
national forests for recreational pur­ direction charge merely the expense
either negative or Inconsistent results,
of
feeding
and
caring
for
the
succes­
other,
nnd
for
the
want
of
n
better
poses Is increasing rapidly and bids
says the medical chief of the gendar­
sive groups of city people who enjoy
name Doctor Mann has called it
fair to rank third among the major
merie.
tlielr privileges.
psuedo berl-beri.
services performed by the national
M alady Decreases.
The growth o f the recreational re­
On the theory that prison diet brings
forests, with only timber production
On one occasion five hospltnl corps
sources o f the national forests Is so
about
a
greater
manifestation
during
and stream flow regulation taking pre­
rapid that specially trained men are
incarceration of Haitians than else­ men from the gendarmerie (natives)
cedence over It, is the statement made
needed to direct and plan for the most
where, the gendarmerie doctors, under volunteered to be bitten by bedbugs
by Col. W. B. Greeley, head of the for­
effective development of this service,
the direction of Doctor Mann, hnve which had been fed on patients with
est service, In Ills annual report. Many
Col. Greeley says.
conducted extensive dletnry experi­ the disease. One of these volunteers
summer homes are being erected in
The protection o f wild life nnd the
ments.' The reports show that diet developed dropsy six weeks later, but
the national forests by private indi­
recognition of the national forests as
variation has produced no marked ben­ tills dropsy was attributed to other
viduals, and the use o f forests for
natural breeding grounds of fish nnd
eficial
results either ns a curative causes, and the experiment wus re­
other forms of out-of-door recreation
game Is closely related to the develop­
or preventive. This has destroyed a garded as negative.
was greater during the past year than
ment of the recreational resources. To
The prevalence of the malady 1ms
theory that war edema, prevalent In
ever before.
make more effective the work of game
shown a progressive decrease during
prison
camps,
due
to
faulty
nourish­
The summer home business promises
protection, In co-operation with the
ment, has a relation to psuedo beri­ the last three months, hut whether
to become an important source of rev­
state nnd locnl authorities, nnd to se­
this Is due to measures taken by Doc­
beri.
enue, Col. Greeley points out. On the
tor Mann nnd his stuff cun he deter­
cure better development of the fish
As
rice,
the
cause
of
true
berl-beri,
Angeles forest in southern California,
Cause Undeterm ined.
nnd gnmo resources o f the national
Is not used to nny degree In the orison mined only after further study und
for example, a total of 1.329 permits
Aided by the medical olllcers of
forests. Col. Greeley believes that con­
food here, the American doctors have careful Investigation. The American
for summer residences nnd commercial
gress should tnuke provision for the the gendarmerie In an intensive re­ endeavored to find n similar lack of naval surgeon explained that he is
resorts were, he says, in effect at the
establishment o f game sanctunries search, Dr. Mann told the New York vitamins in cornmcnl, a base of the enreful not to accept false encourage­
close o f the past fiscal year. The
correspondent
here
that
within which wild life may find se­ Tribune
ments because of the tendency of the
revenue from this one item amounted
curity. These sanctuaries, he says, nothing has developed which may defi­
disease to subside altogether in cer­
to approximately $22,000. It is be­
should he relatively limited in area, nitely determine the cause of the dis­ CHIMES FOR WASHINGTON tain Institutions and then suddenly
lieved that within a few yenrs the rev­
but should be established In consider­ ease, which if ascertained nnd meas­
crop out anew with more serious re­
enues obtained from the various rec-
ures taken to combat would result in
able number.
sults thnn ever.
the saving o f possibly more than 20,-
E lk s S uffer H ardsh ips.
Col. Frederick M. Wise, United
Special attention Is cnlled by Col. 000 lives annually.
States marine corps, commanding the
The disease 1ms three manifesta­
Greeley to the necessity of additional
Gendarmerie d’Halti, nml Col. Jobe
protection for the harassed and deci­ tions. One o f the inost norable symp­
Russell, commanding the First Murine
mated herds o f elk using the Yellow­ toms Is swelling of certain parts of
brlgude In Haiti, have shown great In­
stone National park and the surround­ the body. The flesh becomes water­
terest In Doctor Mann's fight to loente
It usually be­
ing forests.
Famine nnd cold Inst logged or “ dropsical.”
the cause nnd combat Haiti's disease.
winter took an unusually heavy toll gins in the feet and spreads upward.
TheJ have given all possible assist­
Another form Is the dry or emaci­
from their number. Driven out of the
ance nnd placed the entire line of re­
high country by starvation nnd early ated type. The patient shows marked
search unhampered under his direc­
snows, the northern herd suffered emaciation and dwindles almost to
tion.
Often dropsical
from hunters along the boundary line skin nnd hones.
The beneficent and nltrulstlc labor
a percentage loss equal to that o f a changes to dry nnd vice verso. It Is
o f Doctor Mann and his medical
not unusual to see a patient almost
defeated army.
staff Is one o f many compensating fac­
Many that escaped the hunters per­ a living skeleton, then develop a wet
tors In what appears to he a muddled
ished from cold nnd starvation before condition, and with the retention of
sltuntlon In Unit! today. Theirs is a
fluid
In
the
hotly
gain
20
or
30
pounds
spring. The southern herd nlso lost
work for humanity In the strictest
henvlly. As a result, the totnl number In a few days and become so swollen
sense.
of animals in these two herds is now up that recognition o f his features Is
Undoubtedly the United States pub­
estimated by the best qualified officers difficult.
lic health service nnd the Rocke­
One o f the mysteries of the disease
in the forest service to equal half of
feller Institute would take a certain
Is that women seldom, if ever, con­
their number five years ago.
Interest In the strange disease. Doc­
The addition to the Absaroka nnd tract It. One medical officer In Halt!
tor Mann hopes, however, with the co­
I Gallatin forests o f the lands still In has observed more than 1,000 cases
operation o f such Institutions nnd with
government ownership and under with- without finding a single case among
(lie utilization o f such additional facil­
j drawal along the Yellowstone river females. At one time during Doctor
ities, that the results of sustained ef­
Mann's
investigations
women
were
north o f Gardiner is urged by the
forts will serve to eradicate n scourge
j chief forester. This land, he states, Is supposed to bo entirely immune.
that kills such an appalling number of
urgently needed ns winter range for Finally three cases among women de­
Haitians every year.
the elk, nnd Its addition to the nation- veloped nt the same dwelling place
So far ns known, Haiti'* mysterious
I nl forests will materially relieve the This comldnation o f circumstances
disease never has affected a white
situation without working an Injtis- suggested a disease o f an Infectious
man.
I tlce to the locnl inhabitants whose nature.
live stock use the range. If this ac-
Disease A p p e a rs Suddenly.
Installing hells In the tower of St. M aking W o rld Safe fo r Dem ocracy.
| tlon Is not taken the outlook for the
A third manifestation of the malady Mary’s church. Washington, an a me­
Cincinnati.— Determined that the
, northern elk herd Is gloomy. The Is that whirl» suggests plague. From
American ambassador Hugh Campbell Wallace, In the name of the prospects for the southern herd are 5 to Z7 per cent of the fatalities morial to Rev. George GlatL The word “Mr.” shall hnve no place In or
among gatherings of Rotarlnns, Bob
ed States government, presenting distinguished services and navy crosses more bright, but additional purchase take place in j>crsons who do not bells are connected with n large West­
minster clock so as to sound the hour Chapman, president. In fining mem­
bout one hundred officer«* of the French army and navy. The presents- of land for summer feeding grounds complain o f any symptoms.
A per­ In chimes. They vary from two to bers for using It, the fines going to
| appear absolutely essential.
was made In the gardens of the American embassy In Parla.
son will appear In perfect health; five feet In size.
charity.
MANY HOMES BEING BUILT
America Decorates French Heroes