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Show Sufferer Makes a Protest a Whistling Fiend on Railroad Trains Especially Held Up to Obloquy as Worthy of Banishment. A student of the subject haa come to the conclusion that 70 per cent, of the male population of Brooklyn has the whistling mania. In tho early morning, in the evening rush hours, late at night, the puckered lips Inflict their punishment upon the just and the unjust alike. It is apparently unknown to the whistling fiend that the practice is, when indulged publicly, pub-licly, a proof alike of his unmanner-llness, unmanner-llness, his lack of education and of breeding. All employes of the B. R. T. whistle. They begin when they go on duty and keep it up almost continuously until their day's work is done. Perhaps one ought not to blame a B. R. T. man for whistling. Possibly his mind is distracted from his unhappy lot. Possibly, like the traveler by night through a graveyard, he whistles to keep his courage up. And there are lots of cemeteries In Brooklyn. But his remedy Is worse than his disease. The whistling "L" guard may have his excuses. The errand boy may have his So has the brainless clerk in hectic box who varies his whistling act with a gum-chewing act. He has to occupy the outside of his head with something, since there is nothing inside. But the well-dressed passenger passen-ger who whistles has nothing to extenuate ex-tenuate his act Long and careful observation ob-servation shows that he rarely can carry a tune. He simply makes a noise. He is hopeless. He is lost to a sense of decency and self-respect His whistling announces it to all. It is safe to say that no man who makes a practice of whistling In public ever haB risen above mediocrity in business. busi-ness. Make a little study of it and see If this Is not true. You may get enough interest out of It to offset tbt torment you have endured. You will discover, too, that he who makes a weird, uncanny noise with his mouth does so because he has nothing else to do no resource within himself to keep him from dwelling on his own miserable state. Thousands of persons In New York have murder in their hearts every day on account of the whistle fiend. The Inquisition missed its choicest torture by not knowing of the subway sub-way and B. R. T. whistler. He is at his worst between 5 and 6:30 in the evening, when a hundred humans are mashed into a space that should hold ten. On the platform of a subway car that could be packed no tighter without the assistance of a hydraulic jack, the whistle maniac gets In his most telling blows. He usually happens hap-pens to be directly behind you. He blows In the back of your nook. He blows In your ear. He blows over your squirming shoulder and fans your cheek with his torturing breath. And his breath usually is vile. If yon manage to get an Inch out of the direct line he shifts sulficlently to Iteep you as his sounding-board. You inclly wriggle. You pry and tear at him with pinioned elbows. You brace vour inerrcetual feet against anything that will give you a purchase and strive to quit his range. You cannot. If you turn your head and glare at him he whistles in your face triumphantly trium-phantly and puts flourishes on his encore. en-core. You can keep a woman's hatpin hat-pin out of your eyes by intercepting your evening paper between your eyes and it. You can hold your neighbor's willow plume out of your mouth. But you cannot protect your ears' from the tootler, or your lungs from his baleful breath. If Doctor Lederle of the board of health would have signs put up in all public conveyances setting forth the menace of whistling; if the Society for Ethical Culture would put up placards pla-cards proclaiming whistling to be the recognized sign of the empty head, there might be some relief for the innocent in-nocent victim of the whistling fool. But there are some persons who never can be cured. A man who had been tormented by a whistleflend all the way home on an elevated train one night, met a friend to whom he mentioned his Bufferings. Buf-ferings. The friend lent a sympathetic sympa-thetic ear. He went further. He added add-ed his own plaint not only against the fool who whistles, but the knave who rests his filthy boots upon the opposite op-posite seat, advertising his unfamlllar-ity unfamlllar-ity with the rudiments of courtesy, and making the space where his feet had been unfit for man or woman to rest upon. The two chatted understanding. under-standing. "I don't know which is the worse," said the first man, "the biped who takes up three seats with himself, his extended arms and his muddy boots or the fellow who whistles. The whistler is harder to get away from. His torture tor-ture is more definite and persistent I guess he's the worst" "Don't know but he is," replied the other and then, utterly unconscious of what he was doing, he started to whistle. New York Press. |