| OCR Text |
Show the post to carry nlm fur ou bis Journey. Slaughtering the Bobolink. Washington bus gone gunning. Song birds are being slaughtered along the lotomuc .o make a capital holiday. The bobolink, the meadow bird with the bubbling music, and red-winged black birds are being shot by the hundreds In the name of sport and in the prospect of a pot pie. It is forbidden to use firearms la the District of Columbia except during a certain season of the year when In a restricted area the bobolink, with other small birds which delight the countryside dweller in . the summer, may be butchered, on sight. The pop-plug pop-plug of guns Is heard today all through the stretches of marsh grass along what Is known as the Eastern Branch of the Potomac river. Washington, Wash-ington, in a way, Is the headquarters of the greater bird protective campaign cam-paign of the United States, and yet In Washington the Joy birds of the summer time are being made the targets tar-gets of men with a lust for killing. The story of the bobolink is an old one; but there are many In this District Dis-trict of Columbia who do not know it and, seemingly, do not care whether they know It or not. A bird is for sport no matter what the bird may be. Intoxicated With His Own Song. The bobolinks In white, yellow and black nest In the meadows of the North from beyond the Mississippi river to the Atlantic coast They are known to every country boy In the laud. The males, seemingly, are intoxicated with their own music. The bird has been culled the "bucchanallun" bobolink. There Is a sort of a delirium in his summer time Joy. The song has been called rapturous, ecstatic, merry, sparkling and bubbling. It Is all of these and something more. It Is the abandon of music. The bird Is tipsy with glee, for be actually staggers in his flight lie cannot arise out of the meadow ou summer morning without with-out attempting to beat time with his wings to his own music, and the wings cannot keep pace. The male bobolink in the autumn changes his coat and for the winter season dresses like his mate in dull colors. In the fall the birds start southward. Many of them nest on the western prairies, make their way East and then South. In the marshes along the Atlantic coast they are known as reed birds, and there they are shot by the thousands. An uttempt is being made In New Jersey to suve the bobolink from extermination. ex-termination. The New Jersey hunters kill them Just as the District of Columbia Co-lumbia hunters kill them. The plea in excuse Is that when the bobolinks go Into the Oarollnus they destroy a good deal of rice. In these states they are known as rice birds. , There always Is found some kind of an excuse to ease the conscience of the man who likes to destroy beautiful beauti-ful things. One excuse Is as good as another. If the people of the farm lands of the North want to save their summer-time friend "Bob," they should write to their representatives in congress con-gress to ask that the slaughter of this bird of fine song and of fine life In the District of Columbia should be stopped. Plea of a Bird Lover, John Martin, an editorial writer on the Washington Star who has been bedridden for some time, has Just written writ-ten a plea to the public asking that the killing of these Innocents of field and marsh shall be stopped. Mr. Martin Mar-tin writes : "I am interested In birds. They have been my best companions since I have been bedfast In one time Just off my porch I have noted 83 species. spe-cies. I used to kill reed birds on ths Eastern Branch, but never again V This newspaper man with a heart for nature, says this of the bird to whose defense, he has come: "Many writers have lauded ths bobolink bob-olink as a sort of bird angeL Lore, they point out underlies all bird music. mu-sic. And .'God Is love.' When ths bobolink's song propels him skyward In s frenzy of gladness, it may well be, claim these observers, that ho responds re-sponds to emotions more tenderly and finely spun than any that Influence human hu-man actions "Unmindful of the dangers that await them, these happy troubadours are now rising In flocks from ths meadows that stretch from New Jersey Jer-sey to New Brunswick and are heading head-ing leisurely toward the winter home of their dreams Paraguay. For those who have summered farther North, it means a Journey of about 6,000 miles, of which 700 are over the sea. Millions Mil-lions of tbem will fall to complete ths trip. There Is not only the hunter's gun to be encountered, but traps and poisoned bait set out by the owners of the rice plantations will take heavy toll as they move along." PRESIDENT'S WIFE lEBOTETnl IMPORTANT POSITION IN THE WHITE HOUSE WHICH MISS LAURA HARLAN FILLS. CORRESPONDENCE IS HEAVY Vust Understand All That Pertains to Proper Conduct of Social Affairs and Know All the Gradations of Official Life. By EDWARD B. CLARK .Washington. A daughter of a former for-mer associate Justice of the United States Supreme court is social secretary secre-tary to Mrs Calvin Coolldge, wife of the President of the United States. Miss Laura Harlan, daughter of the late Associate Justice John M. Harlan, holds this really important White House position. There may be some plain folk of America who cannot understand why the mistress of the White House needs a social secretary. The title and the suggested duties may seem a trifle undemocratic, un-democratic, but every ruler of the domestic do-mestic end of the White House activities activi-ties for a great many years has been compelled to employ a qualified woman to attend to correspondence and to arrange the hundred odd affairs, suall and great, In which It Is necessary for the First Lady of the Land to engage socially. The country has read much about an overworked President, It has read less about an overworked President's wife. But overworked the presidents' wives are, for they have multitudinous duties to perform which If not properly prop-erly done would lead to misunderstandings, misunder-standings, heartaches and sometimes to breaches of friendship which, seemingly, seem-ingly, are past the healing. The social secretary of the President's Presi-dent's wife must be a woman who knows residential society and who understands un-derstands thoroughly all those things which pertain to the proper conducting of social affairs In which foreigners here present are to participate. Truthfully Truth-fully speaking, the foreigners are understood un-derstood to be the most difficult element ele-ment In the field of White House so-ciul so-ciul activities. Precedents must be observed, and If a subsecretary by any chance, should be given unintentional preference over a secretary, a war cloud would appear upon the horizon. Plenty for Miss Harlan to Do. Miss Harlan, present social secretary, secre-tary, succeeds herself In the position which she holds. She was Mrs. Harding's Hard-ing's secretary for some years. She has lived In Washington virtually all her life, although she was Kentucky born. There Is said to be politics In the selection of a White House social secretary, but It may be only accident that Miss Harlan Is of a Itepubllcan family while her predecessor in the White House was of a Democratic family. A social secretary to a president's wife works at least union hours. She must answer a good many of the letters let-ters which are written to the president's presi-dent's wife, but the number of letters received Is so great that It is necessary neces-sary to employ additional help to see to it that no one who has communicated communi-cated with the First Lady of the Land Is offended because her epistle Is not answered. There are certain letters which the president's wife must write in person and In her own handwriting. These are letters to Intimate friends or are letters cf condolence sent to persons who have met with a loss of someone near and dear. It Is Impossible, for a president's wife to answer all ber letters In person ; but it Is said to be a fact that every answer sent to a letter is read by the president's wife and signed by ber and that a large percentage of the answers actually are dictated by the woman who signs them. Many Write to President's Wife. American women In all parts of ths country write frequently to the president's presi-dent's wife for sympathy and advice. Then there are more than occasionally letters from prisoners in Jails and penitentiaries pen-itentiaries who urge that . the president's presi-dent's wife shall ask ber husband to give special consideration to their cases. Sometimes letters of this kind bring results. There Is a case in point, one of which the writer of this article has personal knowledge. Some years ago t soldier of the United States army deserted, was urrested, convicted and sentenced to the Leavenworth penk tentlary. While awaiting trannporta-tlon trannporta-tlon to Leavenworth he snt down anj wrote a letter to the wife of the president presi-dent He set forth his case, telling of the reasons for his desertion of the colors, and then adroitly called the attention of the president's wife to the fact that he was writing the letter on ChriBtmns Eve, a time when there "should be good will to all men." The letter writer spoke of the loneliness of a Christmas Eve In prison afar from the loved ones at home, and In fact he played on the heart strlnxs of the woman to whom he was writing. Now, for the woe of the thing, the heart of the president's Wife was touched. She read . the . letter to her huaband. He pardoned the prisoner, who was relwised from the guardhouse and told to depart. Ik-fore he departed, depart-ed, however, he managed to ' steal enough money from members of the tws companies that were stationed st |
