Baltimore Evening Sun (19 November 1912): 6.

THE FREE LANCE

Incandesocaput, n, one who complains because the show was clean, a feverhead.

NEW PRIZES FOR PLATITUDES.

So far this week not a single decent platitude! Come, gents, step up and get the prize. This week it is a fine Edam cheese wrapped in tinfoil, direct from the royal laboratories at Utrecht, Holland. Such was my original offer, made last Saturday. But in order to encourage dilletanti I increase it. That is to say, I offer an Edam cheese to each and every looser of a first-rate platitude. No blanks; every contestant a winner! Could a man do more? Let the Honorary Pallbearers step up!

Well, Baltimore fell for it. The moralists were duly aroused to frenzies, the old fellows duly fought for the $5 seats, the house was duly packed—and then Gaby danced her harmless dances and chirped her harmless songs and the laugh was on our fair city.

The truth is that all the excitement about Gaby was cleverly manufactured by her press agent. He came to Baltimore two weeks ago, hired a couple of stenographers, and began inspiring letters of protest to the newspapers. One or two of these letters got into print, genuine moralists were led to write others, the press agent got a chance to explain and defend, friendly journalists lent their aid–and so the trick was done. Even the police, for all their experience of such devices, were wholly taken in. Last night they were at the Auditorium in force, ready to pull the joint at the first sign of debauchery. But the show, of course, was perfectly decent, and what is more, it was very amusing. Every seatholder got his money’s worth, but a good many of them, no doubt, didn’t get exactly what they thought they were buying.

But don’t fancy that the episode refleets discredit upon Baltimore, or that it shows us to be more gullible than the folks of other cities. As a matter of fact, such press-agentish pranks are played constantly in this country, and the one town that falls oftener than all the rest put together is alert and sophisticated New York. Dozens of exotic performers have been put over in Marvelous Manhattan by just such assisted attacks of virtue. Gaby herself is merely the last of a long line of wholly artificial stars of sensation.

One of the first and most curious was Olga Nethersole, whose appearance in “Sapho” 10 or 12 years ago was made a nine-day wonder by Marcus Mayer, a famous press agent of the last generation. Marcus, in fact, worked up such a storm of moral indignation that it got beyond his control, and in the end the theatre was closed by the police and Marcus himself was jailed. But while the fun lasted Olga played to houses packed to suffocation. And after the police and courts were squared, she went on the road with “Sapho” and set the peasants of the hinterland wild.

Forgotten carcasses in the morgue of moral endeavor:

The Hon. Ed. Quarles, the boomer, had a direct wire running from the Auditorium to the offices of 3,000 American and English papers, and was ready to send out bulletins at the drop of the hat. In addition the Associated Press established a field office in the Turkish baths under the theatre. But there was nothing doing, alas, alas!–Adv.

It is common gossip in the downtown kaifs that the Archangel Harry is having a deuce of a time getting suckers to serve upon his orthodox charter commission. There are plenty of Prominent Baltimoreans and “leading” lawyers, of course, who would be glad to accommodate him, if only for the sake of getting their portraits into the Sunpaper, but the needs of the hour obviously call for men who will make a good front, and so the chronic committeemen of the town won’t answer. But where are recruits to be found? They must be respectable in appearance, and yet willing to do as they are told. They must be friends of good government, and yet sufficiently complaisant to let the Royal Family define the term. They must be “well-known,” as the Towel puts it, and yet the public must not be quite on to them.

Will the hon. gent. find ten men who will meet his difficult specifications? I have no doubt that he will in the end. Baltimore is probably better supplied than any other American city with the very sort of stock he seeks. We are overrun by respectable vacuums who are willing to do anything, or to agree to anything, or to advocate anything to get their names into the papers. You may be sure that enough of them will be drummed up to do whatever the Royal Family wants.

Deputy Marshal Manning drew a sheet of litmus paper from his pocket as the curtain went up, and watched it like a hawk all through the performance. But not once did it turn yellow, alas, alas!—Adv.

The tiles are now on the roof of the Hansa Haus and all that remains is to erect a pulpit for Col. Jacobus Hook. The manuscript of his speech of dedication is being manufactured by 20 stenographers, working in eight-hour shifts.—Adv.

Meanwhile, the super-Mahon has at last stopped his feverish explanation of the lamentable event of Black Tuesday. Let the band play, “Oh, That We Two Were Maying.”—Adv.

Baltimore is blowing in more than $20,000,000 this year. Twelve or fifteen years ago the city got along on $7,000,000. Laugh, suckers, laugh!

Sabulocaput, n, a ward heeler, a gravel-head.

But after all, a ward heeler is probably no worse than a mental healer.

Everybody looked for Col. Jacobus Hook, but he had 7 banquets to eat and 12 speeches to make, and so he did not reach the theatre until the last ancient had been hauled out, alas, alas!—Adv.

In the Courthouse alone $50,000 of the taxpayers’ money is wasted every year. Laugh, suckers, laugh!

Fungocaput, n, an old-fashioned job holder, a mushroom-head.

Ovillacaput, n, a Councilmanic orator, a muttonhead.

The real joke is that Gaby is a good dancer and gives a good show.—Adv.