"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 Stueck!_ 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."