O. K.
H. R.,
_Sec._
"Say, H. R., this is the master-stroke! commented Andrew Barrett.
"To-morrow," said H. R. coldly, "one hundred sandwiches on the Avenue.
One of them in front of Goodchild's all day. White canvas. Heliotrope
letters. Pea-green border. Design number eleven. Also insert this ad. in
all the papers."
This was the copy of the advertisement:
_Wanted:_ Perfectly Beautiful Girls. Not merely pretty, nor
merely young, nor merely hopeful, but Perfectly Beautiful!
Object: To make New-Yorkers thank Providence they live in
the same town. Apply H. R., Allied Arts Bldg.
Andrew Barrett read it and left the room shaking his head, unable to
speak coherently.
H. R. looked up a few addresses in the Directory and went out. He called
on the president of the National Academy of Design, on the Professor of
Anatomy of the College of Physicians and Surgeons, on the president of
the National Sculpture Society, the president of the Magazine Cover
Designers' Guild, the president of the Equal Suffrage League, who was
Mrs. Vandergilt, and Professor Tangolino, late of the Argentine
Republic. These, with H. R., would constitute the Public Beauty
Commission and would decide who was perfectly beautiful.
To each he pointed out that the noble cause of charity must be advanced.
Also an American standard of perfect beauty would be established for all
time, their decision being unappealable. The artists instantly approved
the plan, the method being artistic and therefore strictly logical. The
president of the Suffrage League at first demurred. She objected to sex
being dragged into the affair, and, besides, mere physical beauty too
long had been accorded a disproportionate importance in social and
political matters. It degraded a sex fit for higher things than to be
man's plaything. H. R., however, earnestly pointed out that it involved
the recognition of the superior salesmanship of women--not
sales_woman_ship, but sales_man_ship, for while man was no better than
woman in the conduct of the government or anything else, woman was
infinitely the superior of man in many things. He finally induced Mrs.
Vandergilt and the others to serve on the commission.
But the damned newspapers, he warned them, would print names and would,
alas! devote much space to their deliberations.
They said that the regrettable publicity would not stop them from doing
their duty.
He returned to his office and prepared a series of questions for the
papers to ask him. This is the most intelligent form of newspaper
interview because it is always printed. Answers to the reporters' own
questions always appear in the papers when the reporters themselves have
to supply them.
These were the questions--which later on the Public Sentiment Corps
answered with judiciously varied ayes and noes.
1. Were there one hundred Perfectly Beautiful Girls in New
York?