Curtismorphosis

The stamp of a real publisher's personality always descends upon his properties. The gold may be old, but the mintage is the publisher's. Everyone knew that there would be a new face on the coin when Cyrus H. K. Curtis took control of the New York Evening Post (TIME, Dec. 31). Last week, readers examined the new currency. It had undergone a great Curtismorphosis.

In type and in form of "make-up" it had acquired a startling likeness to the Public Ledger (Philadelphia). It bore the names of Mr. Curtis' correspondents and contributors. The eight-column news pages had been lessened to seven. The six-column editorial page had been increased to seven. The editorials which formerly issued from the liberal pen of Simeon Strunsky had gone--for Mr. Strunsky had departed to The New York Times. In their place was the form and, in good part, the editorial substance of the Ledger. The Bowling Green, on which Christopher Morley played so many jovial games of literary nine pins, had been subdivided into small lots, on which Clinton W. Gilbert, author of The Mirrors of Washington ana correspondent of the Ledger, paragraphed with brutal frankness about Washington politics. Last but not least, the face value of the issue was changed from 3-c- to 5-c-.

Certainly neither Hamilton,* Godkin nor White imported their editorials from Philadelphia; the new Post does not promise to be a better paper for "Views," but it does give indications of being a better paper for "News." It remains to be seen whether the New York public will welcome at 5-c- an evening paper distinguished for its news chiefly. If not, the burden of the mistake will be borne by Mr. Curtis' pocket-book.

The first issues of the new Post were not without their journalistic faux pas; for example, a streamer headline over a sport page; ROCKEFELLER SPENDS VACATION ON FLORIDA LINKS--OTHER LIVE SPORT NEWS.

On his last evening on the Bowling Green, Christopher Morley retold A Love Story.

"As soon as I saw her (this was ten years ago, by the way) I had that curious feeling that there was something of destiny in the incident. . . . Well, it didn't take me long to get an introduction. . . . For quite a while-- several years--I lived in another city, and did not see her often. . . . Yet even when she was inaccessible it gave me pleasure to think about her existence. . . . From time to time I sent her some odd trifle or curio that I hoped might please her; at first she returned them, faintly reproving, but with so calm a courtesy that I could see she did not resent my attentions. ... I could never understand how she got the reputation of being ill-natured or cold-hearted (there were some, in the old days, who used to say so), for surely in my experience she was never that. . . . And then--can I forget the day when I learned that she, too, in her secret way, had been thinking tenderly of Me? She sent me word (the darling) that she had come to the conclusion that our friendship might be put upon quite a different footing. . . . I came to see her. . . . And then her familiar and gracious charm had its way with me. . . . Who on earth are you talking about? I can hear you asking. Why, who indeed but the Evening Post?"

Comics

The arched eyebrow over the askance eye of the intellectual has been lifted in deprecation ever since the high name of comedy has been debased by its application to "comic strips." Comic strips, the horseplay of journalism, the daily joy of my honest burghers, have suffered long the stings of contempt. Seldom have they been excoriated so devastatingly or on such grounds as by Alejandro Hoch, an editor from the Argentine, who is visiting these parts. These are his winged words describing this danger to civilization:

"In some of the manufactured newspapers I have been able to see as many as ten distinct series of drawings in which the theme is invariably the disparagement of man by his daughters and wives, conveying to the mind of the readers that the head of the family and the backbone of the nation, is a subject fit only to be ridiculed. Daughters mocking their fathers and wives chastising their better halves hardly uphold the idea of family authority, without which family life surely perishes. Nothing sinks deeper into the simple mind than the repetition of these scenes dished up in a manner suited to their low mentality.

"Surely, the press organization of the United States of America, headed by men of brains, should see that, following the material greatness conquered by the country, evolution must bring about the spiritual predominance equal in power, which is being; killed in the bud by just such foolish, inane and at times immoral sections as the feature service, which should be labeled 'for illiterates only'"

* Alexander Hamilton founded the New York Evening Post in 1801.