Miscellany, Dec. 12, 1938

Paint

In Washington, the Food and Drug Administration, completing an investigation of powders, pastes, lotions and enamels preparatory to enforcing the cosmetics section of the new Food, Drug, and Cosmetics Act, discovered that modern women paint themselves in 1,400 different shades.

Umbrella

In France, since Munich, wits have referred to Britain’s Prime Minister as “J’aime Berlin.” In Belgium, having seen that there was one article of worldly goods which Mr. Chamberlain never was without, not only wits but solid citizens began strolling into umbrella stores and asking for “um chamberlain.”

Gambling

A Gallup survey on gambling games found that while Protestant and Roman Catholic moralists periodically protest against U. S. churches raising money by gambling—bingo, lotteries, raffles—the most popular kind of gaming, indulged in by 29% of the population, is that conducted by churches. Reason: most people do not consider it really gambling.

Lawyer

On Staten Island ten years ago, Law Student Charles A. Mulligan Jr. was notified that he had passed his New York bar examination, was overwhelmed by congratulations from his friends. Then he was notified that it had all been a mistake— he had failed. Ashamed, he hid the fact, rapidly became a successful criminal lawyer. Recently he asked New York City’s Mayor LaGuardia for appointment as a magistrate. Last week, after an investigation, he was indicted.

Purchasers

In London, the Almost Modern Order of Purchasers, a 17-year-old society whose 250 members are men “of good repute, who have made a darned stupid mistake or been badly done,” met for its semi-annual dinner. Newest member: a patriotic stock-broker who was so carried away during the European crisis that he enlisted simultaneously in the Army, the Navy, the Air Force.

Screwballs

In Manhattan the Screwballs of America, “a new society to protect the right to laugh,” met for their first national conference in the 35th Street excavation of the unfinished Sixth Avenue subway, appointed President Roosevelt their patron saint, cabled Adolf Hitler: “If the sound of laughter is ever heard in Berlin, run for the nearest border.”

Prohibition

The mayor of Crosnes, a village near Paris, France, issued a decree forbidding the dogs of his commune to bark from 10 p. m. to 6 a. m.