Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 2, 1914)
TTTE STTXDAT OKEGOTiTATT. PORTLAND, AUGUST 2, 1914. ; IN WORDS . AND PICTURES onfe ornery 3 "Auto-Fois Auto-Mbeurs Which Is Swedish for The Point of View Changes With the Income A caricature of the author and artist fcv himself. TEN years ago you and Polly went alxut in the streetcars. Five years ago you used taxis occasionally. a. i :A . "Tf T koJ on iirr.mnriiln T think At mat penoo ju emu. a i . i "I don't think you and I could be as thoughtless and selfish as some of our rich friends, eould we?" Polly remarked. "No," you asserted warmly. "It isn't that we put ourselves np as being saintly, or any rot like that,but " "No," agreed Polly. "I know what you mean we simply aren't built that way. We shouldn't be happy if we thought some of our poorer friends had to struggle up to our house to dinner in the subway when we had a perfectly good motorcar." That was five years ago. The awakening of Helena Ritchie was a deep, snoreless sleep compared to yours. . It's a cinch to put a dream-car at the disposal of your friends. "Well, anyhow! Bitten by Gasolene Bug The time arrived when you could not exactly afford, but yon could at least buy a car. Prom the moment you are bitten by the great Klaxon-Horned Gasolene Bug, the motorcar takes precedence of everything else home ties, duty, the hope of a future life all are If orgotten for the time being. Your library table is littered with specifications, booklets and photos of every kind of car; so is your desk. Tour overcoat pock ets bulge with them. Yoi spend hours whioh ought to be spent at your desk standing around on the glassy floors of the motor harems amongst the potted palms listening to the sirens softly honking of their wares. "BUnkensop h telling this be came he Wants a more power ful car." I could send for my friends once in a while." "Why, it would be half my pleasure in having a car to put at the disposal of my jSriends. ' ' Mniiv screen tvim vuu. You continued, "It n - 71 nnix Vnn even come sneakin? back at night, when the shops are closed, and gaze hypnotized through the Pittsburg panes at the car of your dreams ; then back again after breakfast with the fanatical enthusiasm of the Wagnerite at Bayreuth. While Polly is trying the seats of the smart tbwn car up near the window, one of the Benzine Brurumels is telling you something beginning with: "I guess you've heard this one. Stop me if yon have " This is done to rest yonr brain from the exertion of trying to understand why the tail-light is not attached to the radiator fan. Otherwise these cataracts of "differentials," "multiple disk" and "cone dutches," "timing gears" and "splash systems " would rock your mentality and perhaps make it turn turtle and sink at the dock. They speak kindly of other cars and tell you in what essentials they are lacking not knocking, mind you or only a little in one cylinder. They pass demonairly over the stupid and minor considerations of construction and leap, as it were, with a glad cry of home coming to the important points like the cigar-lighters and the ini tial on the door panels. There is where they are on safe ground and m become eloquent.. , Bales of Testimonials They show you scrapbooks full uf testimonial letters from reg ular business men regular fellers who sit at desks and have tele phones and paper-weights and office boys and things letters writ ten on bona fide typewriters, and they have "PXG" down in the corners just like real letters. These men write and tell them how oraxy they are about their new cars; how they would rather be wrecked in one of their cars than ride safely in any other make. You can't help being im pressed. You put off telling them that you are going to buy a second hand car as long as you can, and when you tell them what a piker you are, you are awfully surprised they don't throw you bodily through the plate glass windows. No, it is really so; they still talk to you as if you were an out-and-out white citizen. These gentlemanly salesmen even gloss over your bad break to the extent of being willing to actually sell you a second-hand ear themselves. They speak of them as "rebuilt' ti v,,-it ; tVio cqttio (ipcrree that vour blue serge suit U. cal9 X IICJ a.ic iruuui in 11"- ..' . . ' isn't as if automobiles could catch pneu- is rebuilt when you send it around to the tailor's to be sponged and j Trri:T. 1 winonc riToccpfl 1 "Rebuilt cars" pressea. v vv men, uy iuc v, n" f " guess you have heard this one. Stop me if you have." are covered by the same guarantee as their new cars, which guar antee is worth fully 8 cents in confederate money. They show you and Polly the "rebuilt" oar. A distinct bar gain. Polly had it on the tip of her tongue to say, "Why did she leave her last place?" when Brummel anticipated her by volunteer ing: "Blinkensop is selling this because he wants a more pow erful car." "I thought you said this was a powerful car!" you venture, a shade uneasily. "Powerful! All the power you'll ever want, my boy! We'll take him up Fort George hill, eh, Bud?" This to the demonstrator, who shifts on to his other foot and smiles: "Nothing to it!" You feel rebuked. You and Polly are given a demonstration. You are Best Salesman The psychology of the trade starts psyching at the moment you take your seat in the car. The instant the wheels turn, you are a goner. You are now the best salesman they have. You sell yourself the car. You root for that car as if it' were something you had invented yourself. You are only too willing to be convinced of its perfection; only too anxious to believe all these Indians tell you in their salaried enthusiasm. .An awful clattering underneath your feet, that in later years of experience would clearly indicate frazzled bearings, you are now eager to have explained away as nothing but the sweet purr of perfect mechanism. You sit on the edge of the seat, nerves taut, inwardly challeng ing these men to say anything nasty about their own goods. Their own? Yours. Nothing short of spontaneous combustion or the complete destruction of all the roads in the United States can stop you from buying that car. You clutch the leather arm-rests with the fierce joy of owner ship and cry: "Gee, some boat!" "We could a-done that hill just as easy on high!" pins the wicked demonstrator as he looks around for your approval. "When can I have it?" you hiss, hardly recognising your own voice. "By the way," says the salesman, doubtfully, to the wieked demonstrator, "this car "isn't sold, is it?" . "Oh. my God!" "Oh, no, it's all right; I was thinking of that 1911 runabout of Johnson's; no, it's all right!" "Oh!" You nearly swallowed your Adam 's apple. "It will take about two weeks to paint it," says the cunning salesman. "You can have it any old color you like I" You and Polly would like dark blue. "In that case I'm afraid it would take from four te five weeks, as they have to scrape it down to the bone." "Gosh, I don't want to wait all that time!" you groan. He knew you wouldn't. "Well, then, why not have it crimson?" "Why it's crimson now!" you say, glancing quickly over the side. "Yes, something on that shade; it would be stunning! "Yes, I guess that would be bully, wouldn't it, Polly?" The curtain is lowered to indicate the lapse of two week. Your Car Arrives The car is at your door, with the chauffeur. The same salesman that stung you with the car stung you also with the chauffeur. ' The lemon and the lemonade. The next step is to get a couple of innocent friends to fo with you to drive. In certain ways owning'your first oar is like being in love. You want everybody to meet the girl. You and Polly and the two- innocent friends start gaily up Broadway in the car. You have decided to go to Yonkers, a mod erate though eccentric ambition. At about One Hundredth street something happens. You don't know what. Neither does the chauffeur. But the beautiful crimson chariot refuses to proceed and punctuates its refusal with extraordinary noises. The chauffeur starts it again. Hope is renewed bang! Stop , . 1.1- i: - r il. ,...,,,!- Chaff eur gets out again ana lilts up tne uu ui m That get it home he will, ha never having been towed home it his professional lift. As there doesn't seem to be anything els to do, you all gel out and go home in the subway. The friends murmur snmct hirp about enjoying the ride, and you mutter something shout ! to try it again some time. After trying in vain to get that ear out of town or even pasl One Hundred and Sixteenth street, it dawns on you that someone has unloaded an acid fruit on yon. The chauffeur (whote salary you paid, by the way, during the two weeks the car was being painted, as otherwise yon might not be able to hold him, end there being only one chauffeur in t hr city at the time) suggests your letting him take down the engine You say, "I don't know what it is, bat do it." 8o he takes down the engine, whose piston rings, had you but known about such things, were draped around the pistons with the same mathc matical precision that the rope rings fall around the stake in th game ef ring-toss on shipboard. " don't know what it is, but do it." When friend chauffeur had finished putting the engine together again, he had enough parts left over to make a cheap vacuum cleaner and a pair of Colonial ndirona. You Finally Get a Car You finally get a real ef, but you never forgive that agree able voung salesman who sold you the first one. You walel, tM him in the streets. You wouldn't, of course, want to run svan hm.. At least, not all over him. It seems now, since you've had several cars, that you can t remember not having one. Polly says you act that way. In what particular way? "Oh," says Polly, "for instance, the 1 1 are coming to dinner tonight and you hadn't thought to send our car for them." ,, "Well, I'll send for them if you want mc to, lolly. "No, I don't particularly care. I was just thinking the way vou and' I used to talk when we didn't have a car." "I get you, Polly, but I thought I wouldn't send Peter ont to night, as we've been using him pretty steadily these last few nights." That's one phase of the thing. mi :e ,,r par around for some people six times l UVU 1L JUU oiuu j - running, and for some idiotic reason you carelessly forget to send i il. j! -- nr,A onA fumhlps around. Nothing. Conversation ex- ai me u.u - T pires You laugh hysterically and remark that something must be the matter. Chauffeur says it's all of that, and that you will all have to get out and let him get the car home when he can. for them the seventh time, the frost is on the pumpkin. Jessie dear, the next time you see them! Which shows you the truth ol the old adage: "Never start anything you can't continue forever.' (Copyright, 1914, Otis F. WoodV) WHAT DISRUPTS THE FAMILY tn the annual report of the court to the Board of Aldermen: Wh.n the Brooklyn Domestic Rela tions Court began its sessions for last year the magistrates Bitting In It de cided to And out as nearly as might be tie underlying causes of disunion in the families that cams under their no tice. The probation officers were in structed to examine each case intrusted to them and record the reasons dis closed to them for marital disaster. The result of their inquiries Is given in the subjoined table, which Is Included Cause. Drink Other women Laziness Ji alius? Incompatibility flamMIng Out of work Lair and untidy wives Mother-in-law interference. Other men (accusations it h.iahatftdfl) Cruel treatment Number. Per ct. sno 40. a 117 70 IS 75 33 80 20 13 1", 9.2 8.9 8.S 3.S s.: 2.S 1.4 10 1.2 .9 finch a tabulation must, of necessity. be only roughly accurate, from the na ture of the cases examined, as. for ex ample, in the classification under "drink," in which undoubtedly are re corded many Instances of domestic In felicity due originally to less easily stated incitements, which finally led the partners at fault to dissipation, landing them In the court. It will be observed that lack of employment is charged with a small share of the re sponsibility for family trouble: it may be conjectured that adversity, as the poets love to teach, binds human be ings more closely, rather than separat ing them; or It may be that the futility of pursuing a penniless, workless mate may affect these figures. Let all humor ists take note of the official demolition of the mother-in-law Jest. During the year 392 persons were convicted In the court. It would be supposed that a large proportion of Per ct. 1.7 34.0 37.7 26. (J these would have been youngsters, un able to submit to the readjustments necessary to successful matrimonial life. From the figures this does not appear to be the case: Aves. Number. 16 and 20 years J 20 and 3o years JJJ fo and 40 years JJ .A 1 ..... -A . 10 Thus the presumably wild and unset tled chaps under 30 behaved better than their elders of from 30 to 40, while the graybeards of 40 and upward failed lamentably to disclose a better dispo sition than their juniors. Perhaps the tango Is responsible for this; its rava ges are particularly disastrous among those old enough to know better, New York Sun. A PARADISE FOR TRAMPS I believe that I have discovered the tramps' paradise and in Ireland. I have tramped several hundreds o miles In Ireland during the last few months and frequented a great many of the resorts of the professional tramp. I have been In casual wards and . common lodging houses in the north and south of Ireland, and I have met scores of fat, contented tramps In both places who could not be Induced to change their mode of living for any consideration. One very wild Saturday night I found myself stranded In the city of Belfast without money, shelter, or friends. At about 2 o'clock on the Sunday morning I was accosted by a member of the Royal Irish Constabulary, who expressed a desire to know what I was doing out at that unearthly hour, and in the pouring rain. I explained briefly but concisely, and he was most sympathetic. "How long Is It since you had some grub?" he asked. 1 Informed him quite truthfully that I could scarcely remember. It seemed M long ago. Tm going off duty now." he ssld. "Come with me to the barracks." I went with him to the barracks, and was soon doing Justice to a hearty meal of bread and meat, wasi.ed down iwlth hot coffee. Another occasion on which I ex perienced the kindness cf the police was during a brief visit to Bray, the Irish Brighton a charming seaside re sort 12 mllee out of Dublin. It was a case of boots this time, and I wanted a pair badly. To a burly constable I explained what I wanted, and, to cut long story short, I got my boots. I'm wear ing 'em now, and I've a notion they'll last me a few months yet.