Baltimore Evening Sun (2 July 1912): 6.

THE OFFICIAL FORECAST [The super-Mahon in his official paper:] When the showdown comes he [I] will be UNANIMOUSLY nominated for the Vice-Presidency.

From the sedulous Hot Towel of this morning:

One of the things which has impressed the leaders has been the quiet and dignified way the Mayor has carried on his campaign.

The italics are mine. But the unsuspected sense of humor is the Towel’s.

Postcard inquiry from an Old Subscriber:

What the deuce do you understand by the term “Prominent Baltimorean”?

A Prominent Baltimorean is any male Baltimorean who owns a dress suit, is a member in good standing of the Merchants and Manufacturers’ Association, is opposed to the Child Labor and Eight Hour laws, acts as honorary pallbearer at least seven funerals a year, is a member of at least two public boards or commissions which never meet, smiles like a chimpanzee whenever Sonny Mahon speaks to him on the street, has served on at least one “business men’s” political perfuming committee, prefers “The Follies of 1911" to “Tristan und Isolde,” owns a “library edition” of Guy de Maupassant bought from a book agent, regards all Socialists as scoundrels, has a theory to account for the panic of 1907, sends his children to Sunday-school as a punishment for petty misdemeanors, believes in boomery, is or wishes he were a director of a national bank, permits young reporters to affix his name to nonsensical interviews, praises every other Prominent Baltimorean who dies, has his shoes shined every day, cultivates an illegible signature, thinks that it is immoral for a workingman to get drunk on Saturday night, contributes to all relief funds managed by newspapers, is habitually referred to by the Sunpaper as “well known” and constantly argues that Baltimore is going to the dogs.

The way that Corrupt Practices Act looks nowadays, you can hardly tell whether it’s got holes in it or is wrapped around the holes.

Not to be outdone by Bryan, the Hon. the super-Mahon announces that he will decline the nomination if it comes to him by the tainted votes of scroundrels of the John Finney type.

Last call for Colonel Pabst! Are we ever to see and sniff that Baltimore Muenchener? Or was it all a dream, a chimera, a wraith, a bluff?

Contributions to the code of baltimorality:

It is wrong for a ticket-speculator to sell a ticket that he has bought and paid for. It is not wrong for a political boss to steal a seat for a ward heeler.

My great and good friend, the Hon. William Larkins, who had Booth street swept in April for the first time in 28 years, is stealing all the municipal honors of the present assemblage. He is on the job early and late and keeps his white wings busy eternally. While the convention is in session the streets surrounding the hall are sprinkled every half hour and all debris is grabbed up instanter. Throw a peanut shell into Hoffman street and before it lands upon the asphalt one of Mr. Larkins’ gentlemanly scavengers will have it by the neck. In brief, the very pattern of an ardent official. Long may he wave!

The betting odds in the Westport and Back River poolrooms, as reported by the county police:

4 to 1 that Harry makes ’em swaller him. 5 to 1 that Bob Padgett, deep down in his heart, ain’t in favor.

The report of Trauty Tratfelter, just turned in to the Hon. Aristides Sophocles Goldsborough, camerlengo to the super-Mahon, shows that he passed in 4,736 frail-heads for the spontaneous Clark demonstration of last Thursday night, that he duly instructed 2,564 of them in the technique of clapperclawing and tested the proficiency of the rest, and that he wore his mustard-colored Sunday clothes, the livery of his office, for 42 hours running. As a reward for his assiduity, the Hot Towel has been ordered to boost him for Congress.

How they refer to themselves on their public signs:

Mr. Bryan. THE HON. James H. Preston.

Boil your drinking water! And then lay in some reliable spring water! And then boil the spring water! And then don’t drink it!

The subcommittee on drinking facilities of the Municipal Democratic Convention Committee contributes to the general grouch by reporting that the following stimulants, laid in for the convention trade, remain unsold and undrunk:

172,000 gallons of Maryland rye.
74,000 gallons of Bourbon.
8,900 gallons of gin.
4,500 gallons of brandy.
8,800 barrels of pseudo-Pilsener.
11,400 barrels of quasi-Muenchener.
62,000 barrels of common drinking beer.
8,000 000 maraschino cherries.
1,450,000 cocktail olives.

Or, to make a summary, the equivalent of 22,750,000 drinks. It will take Baltimore nearly six weeks to get outside of all this surplus refreshment, and if the Sunday trade is cut off it will take six months.

Tip for the Maryland Antivivisection Society, the morose, the melancholy:

At the Nursery and Child’s Hospital yesterday morning clinical thermometers were thrust down the throats of 78 reluctant infants. No anaesthetics were used!

Geheimrat Prof. Dr. John G. Turner, Jr., is thinking of translating his “Physiology” into English, for the instruction and amusement of the vulgar.—Adv.

Delegates elected to the Illinois State Democratic Convention at the Cook County Democratic Convention, held in Chicago Apri1 15, 1912:

Meanwhile, the Hon. William H. Anderson is in the gallery—and his fingers are constantly and diabolically crossed.