EVER IN THE LIMELIGHT
Close Watch Kept on the Man of
Many Interests.
HIS EVERY MOVE IS CHRONICLED
Even a Few Hours’ Absence from His Usual
Haunts Causes Flurry Among Brother Oper
ators—How Business Secrets Are Some
times Wormed from Shrewd Men
of Business.
NEW YORK.—“The man of
many interests can no
more get away from the
penetrating rays of pub
licity than a cat can get
away from its tail,” said
the old-time detective. “In the first
jdace, the nation at large is keeping
its eye on him. But that's only one
eye. There are a thousand little blaz
ing orbs that follow him wherever he
goes during business hours. Let him
be absent from his office at a time
when the bankers, brokers and traders
believe he should be there, and
straightway goes a notice over the
ticker to every one of them.”
“J. P. Morgan is said to be detained
at his home by illness," runs the mes
sage, if it be about hint, or “E. H. Har
riman, who is not at his office to-day,
is reported to be about to make a trip
to the Pacific coast."
Whoever It may be who has tem
porarily dropped out of sight a rush
' is at once made for his office.
Perhaps the firm gives out a state
-ment. If this formal communication
seems all right, that settles it. If it
contains a word or clause that looks
suspicious tiie chase is redoubled.
Messages fly fast over the telegraph
and the long-distance telephone
wires. And If possitive. reassuring in
formation be not forthcoming within
an hour the wildest rumors begin to
appear.
Mr. Harriman a while ago dropped
out of sight for four hours, relates Al
len L. Benson In the New York Herald.
The usual inquiry was begun. In (he
course of 30 minutes it was definitely
determined that Mr. Harriman was not
at his home. In the nest 15 it was
learned he had been in Boston and
was not feeling well. A fail hour from
the start news came that he had left
Boston. The facts slopped coming.
No one knew where he was going. No
one knew what was the matter with
him.
Rumors Fly Thickly,
During the next three hours almost
every ' conceivable rumor about Mr.
Harriman was started—he was seri
ously ill; he was about to go to a hos
pital for an operation; lie had been
operated on; he was better; he wraa
worse.
i And then definite information came
that nothing of importance was or had
been the matter with him.
During the panic last year Mr. Mor- ■
gan could not have inton watcited much
more carefully if he had been a spe
cial train running a mile a minute un
der the constant observation of the
beat dispatcher on the road.
Yet It is not In such daylight opera
Sl'-tr
Messages Fly Fast Over the Teleph -r.e Wires.
lions, lasting only a few hours, that
' business” shows its greatest acute
ness of vision or its most unflagging
persistence. It is when the big finan
ciers want to force Homebody's hand
or to o otain inside information regard
ing another's plans that the eye of a
hawk becomes, in comparison, like
that of a grocery store codfish. In
Buch emergencies beautiful women
have sometimes been hired to follow
men for months—to Europe and back
k
if necessary—to get one word of busi
ness between two w’ords of idle chat
ter, as women have also been em
ployed to seek the confidence of wives
for tlie same purpose.
As an illustration of what business
men sometimes do in the way of shad
owing, the following incident sur
passes any other:
Went Almost Too Far.
In the financial district is a firm,
capitalized for many millions, that is
rated in Bradstreet's at AAAI. There
are three partners. Two of the part
ners did not like the other one. He
was intractable, disagreeable, hard to
get along with. They decided to get
rid of him and offered to buy him out.
He wouldn’t sell. Then they offered
to sell. He wouldn't buy.
Finally the two hit upon a plan.
Their partner had announced his in
tention of taking a trip to Europe.
They would send a detective with him.
Perhaps he would do or say something
that would be to their advantage. Per
haps, upon his return, he would be
willing to sell rather than to have the
detective's report sent where it would
be read with the greatest interest.
So the partner and the detective de
parted. The partner's visit dragged on
From week to week, and finally into
months, and upon each returning ship
fame the reports of the man who had
been sent to watch him. But the re
ports were of no interest even to the
men who read them. Their partner
seemed to be conducting himself ad
mirably, so far as his own interests
were concerned, though quite unfor
unately for those who wanted to buy
lim out. But they knew him—or
hought they did—and waited for more
■eports.
But the rest of the reports were like
he first, and the man himself came
lome without his partners having ch
ained the kind of information they
wanted.
It was then they shuffled the deck to
slay what they believed was their
rump card.
Pretty Woman as Decoy.
One of the partners had a very
rretty cousin, a young woman. She
was summoned to the home of her
■elative and told that important busi
less considerations made it desirable
hat she perform for them a very deli
:ate task. She should appear at the
jffioe and go to work, apparently as an
ordinary employe. Her purpose in do
ng so should be to cultivate the ac
juaintance of the third partner. But
the should bide her time. There should
be nothing in her conduct toward him
o suggest to so shrewd a man the pos
sibility of a plot. Yet when the time
I came she should recognize the moment
| and play the game.
The time finally came. The partner
asked her to go to dinner with him
the next evening. She had been to
dinner with him before and had gained
enough of his confidence to know this
dinner was not to be like the others.
But she lost no lime in accepting the
invitation, and still more promptly
told her cousin.
An) hour later the cousin was in a
| private detective agency with the
chief. Carefully he told the story of
how he and his agreeable partner had
tried to buy out the disagreeable other
fellow and. having failed, had engaged
a man to shadow him to Europe. Even
more minutely he went over the mat
ter concerning the hiring of the pretty
cousin. Then he came to his point.
He wanted two detectives assigned
to shadow the couple, first to the the
ater and then to their ultimate destina
tion. Within a minute after the ar
rival of the third partner and his com
panion one of the detectives should
knock on the door, which the beautiful
cousin would thereupon open. The
other partners would at once appear,
feign surprise, indignation and anger,
and the next morning the third part
ner would be told he must sell out at
their figure or suffer exposure.
Shown Error of Their Ways.
The detective chief listened in si
lence until the story was told.
“Do you realize," said he, "you have
asked me to help you do something
for which we would both be sent to
state prison?”
The gentleman expressed great
amazement.
"You have asked me to aid you in
springing a trap by means of which
you plan to force your partner to sell
at a price fixed by yourself property
that he does not want to sell. Now,
what would be the result if I were to
do it?
"The partner of whom you are try
ing to rid yourself would go home and
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spend a sleeples night. About eight
o’clock in the morning he would say
to himself: ‘I can stand this no
longer. I must go to my attorney and
seek his advice.’
“He'd go. His attorney would listen
to his story, take out his watch, note
the time—nine o’clock—and say: ‘I
want you to go with me at once to the
district attorney’s office and swear out
a warrant for that young woman for
conspiring to extort money from you.’
“The third partner would swear to
the warrant and the young woman
would be arrested. Within an hour
after her arrest the whole story
would be wrung from her and war
rants would be sworn out for you and
your other partner.
“Abandon this scheme. Go to your
office, to-morrow morning and tell your
partner you came within hailing dis
tance of the penitentiary to-night, but
luckily escaped it. If ever you have
any honest detective work to do 1 shall
be at your service, but this case I
would not take for a million dollars.”
Again the Feminine Element.
On another occasion a firm of big
operators wanted to get inside infor
mation concerning a multi-millionaire's
ultimate plans for .the development of
a great property. There was no use
of sending men to brush up against
him. He never talked to men. But he
had evidently promised his aged grand
mother he would never be unkind to
a woman, so they determined to cap
italize this trait of his character.
From no one knows where they en
listed the services of as pretty a wom
an as ever rode down Fifth avenue.
In a few’ days she appeared at the
hotel in which the great capitalist
made his home. She was beautiful
erough to be conspicuous in any com
pany—diffident enough to make her
attractiveness compelling. She neither
sought nor declined introductions to
others, passing her time as any well
bred woman in afituent circumstances
might wish to do. As good an automo
bile as is made in France took her
from and to the hotel. And the car
bo're her monogram.
Wise Gentleman Easy Victim.
Her life in this hotel was destined
to be marked by two great days, and
it was six months before the first one
came. On that day she was intro
duced to the man on account of whom
some one had bought all her fashion
able gowns and finery, her motor car
and paid her hotel bills. She chatted
with him for ten minutes and then
bade him good evening, just as his in
terest in her was ascending by leaps
and bounds. The next day he asked
her to ride with him through the park,
and she politely declined.
For three months this handsome
young feminine person played with
this wise gentleman in much the same
manner that a cat would toy with a
mouse it intended ultimately to eat.
Little by little she let it be known
she was a widow. Reared by an in
dulgent father, all she had known
about money was that it was made in
the mint and her papa got it. Nor did
her husband force upon her more defi
nite knowiedge of the manner in
which dollar bills are nursed i*nto tens
and tens into hundreds.
Then death came upon their happy
home, and in a twinkling the responsi
bilities of a large fortune were thrust
upon her. She disliked these burdens
so. She was never train.ed to bear
them, she had neither aptitude nor
liking for such tasks, and she was in
constant fear of tnmbing into pitfalls.
The gentleman was duly sympathet
ic. To the best of his limited ability
he would at any time instruct her.
Was she at that time contemplating
any investment about which he might
enlighten her? She was not.
This woman knew what to do—or,
rather, she had been told what to do.
Her employers wished to know wheth
er it was the intention of the gentle
man to force a certain stock to a still
higher figure—it was then high—or
let it sag back. She hided her time
until she believed the light moment
had come and then edged around to
the subject. A transaction that need
not be entered into here had left her
several thousand dollars which she de
sired to reinvest. Would the gentle
man advise her to buy stock in his big
concern at its present high price?
Fell Into the Trap.
He ought to have known better, but
he didn't. He ‘‘fell’' for the "widow's”
query without a premonition of danger.
And he told her not only what he hon
estly believed, but what he knew to be
true. The price of the stock was to be
slaughtered in a few weeks.
She thanked him and did not invest.
Neither did her employers. More Ilian j
that, they sold what they did have.
And what they saved by getting out
while the price was high made the
cost of paying the “widow’s" expenses
for six months look like a. rain-check
beside a tliousand-dollar bill.
Another business man sent a mes
senger to request the chief of a private
detective agency to call on him.
“I want you to find out," said he,
“what So-and-So is going to do with
such-and-such a property. He is the
hardest man in the world to get any
information from. He doesn’t even
talk to his wife. But lie’s got a (laugh
ter who can talk like a phonograph.
Furthermore, I think that girl of his
knows what he’s tip to all the time.
As nearly as I can an .1 out. she’s the
only one he con hues in—she winds
him around her finger if she wants to.
“Now. v hat I want you to do is this:
There are a lot of young men without
much means in this town whose social
position is just as good as So-and-So's
and his daughter’s. I want you to find
one of them who will consent to go on
this case. I'll put up all the money he
needs to make good with the girl.
And I want you to have him go after
her as if she were the only girl he had
ever loved. If he has to. let him even
propose to her—but he needn’t marry
tier if he doesn’t want to—but if she
has the information I want he must
get it."
The chief politely declined, and the
case went elsewhere, if it went any
where.
DIET AND
HEALTH
By DR. J. T. ALLEN
Food SpecialUt
Author of "‘Eating for a
Purpose.’' “The JVctv
Gospel of Health."
Etc.
(Copyright, by Joseph B. Bowles.)
ECONOMICS OF EATING
An army marches on its stomach.
This is a well established principle in
warfare. A hungry man cannot fight
long, and a general whose brain is
clouded by auto-intoxication cannot
conceive brilliant or wise movements.
Every nation considers carefully
what ration will best support the man
behind the gun—at least in war time
—and some have won great victories
by superior feeding, notably the Jap
anese, in the recent contest with
Russia.
The Roman gladiators were fed on
rye and wheat, and the modern ath
lete is very carefully fed by the scien
tific trainer. Only the average man
who has the battle of life to fight gets
no dietetic training.
You cannot eat your cake and leave
It, too. Suppose that I have a de
gree of vitality for daily use represent
ed by 80 on a scale of 100. Another
might have 90 or 60 or 20. But it is
certain that I can no more use my
stock of vitality for the day in two
ways than I can be in two places at
once.
Suppose I eat for dinner fried pota
toes, fresh pork, boiled cabbage,
pickles and pie. with a cup of coffee.
I should expect to be very “logey”
during the afternoon; at least four
fifths of the nervous energy that T
ordinarily spend on my work would
have to be spent in digesting the
heavy meal. If by using the whip I
persisted in spending as much vitality
in brain exercise as I generally do,
and ate an evening meal as usual, lack
of vivacity in the hours following and
disturbed sleep would be the obvious
and necessary result.
I might continue on this basis for
days, weeks, months, or possibly
years, if I had an iron constitution,
but the end would be a breaking down,
prematurely, of the system, disease
showing itself in the guise of “dyspep
sia." “rheumatism,” “diabetes,” “tuber
culosis," "typhoid,” one or more of
them, according to my inheritance
from "the third and fourth genera
tion,” according to excess in eating
meat, starch, pickles, according to the
supply in the food of iron, phosphorus,
sulphur, etc., and according very large
ly to the air. water, exercise, physical
and mental, and the drinks 1 had
taken during those days, weeks,
months or years when I was prepar
ing to enter a hospital or a sanitarium
for classification as an acute, chronic,
curable or incurable sufferer.
It is said that “one man's meat is
another man's poison." This must be
true to some extent; because tempera
ments differ, mental states differ, and
temporary bodily conditions differ. I
know a man who sickens at the
thought of eating oysters, and another
who cannot eat a spoonful of honey
without Buffering, The former once
ate freely of oysters and was made
very sick thus establishing a subjec
tive impression that causes nausea
when the eating of oysters is suggest
ed. Investigation of a number of
cases like thi6 has led me to the con
clusion that idiosyncrasies of this
character are caused by errors in eat
ing and that they are hereditary. In
fact, I suppose the bilious tempera
ment is the result of one habit of eat
ing, the effects of which are heredi
tary, the sanguine of another, the
nervous of another, just as the phy si
cian finds in his daily practice that
peculiar conditions of stomach, of
bowel digestion or of liver can be
traced in family history. This ex
planation harmonizes with that an
cient saying: "The parents ate sour
grapes, and the children's teeth are
set on edge.”
Yet, with all due allowance for
these peculiarities and for patholog
ical conditions, such as diabetes, i:i
which starch and sugar must be avoid
ed. there should be little variation in
the diet of persons of the same age,
doing the same kind cf work. The
appetite of neither adult nor child
should be pampered. The practice of
inducing over-eating by tempting the
appetite with unnaturally seasoned
and unnaturally mixed foods destroys
the natural appetite, and, therefore,
the natural enjoyment of eating. If
a lad cannot enjoy a good crust of
bread he does not nerd to oat. Tho
appetite that does not prefer dates,
figs and raisins to artificial sweets is
cot nat ural.
The average working man needs
daily about two ounces of proteid
{uncoagulated> and vegetable salts,
four ounces of fat and twelve ounces
(dry) of carbo-h>drate in the form of
fruit sugar or starch of potato, cere?.],
etc. This should of course be varied
according to the work done, but no
absolute rule can be laid down. When
there is an extraordinary expenditure
of muscular energy for a short time, it
is best to lose weight and gain it
again gradually. So when there is.
temporarily, great mental strain, it is
best rather to decrease than to in
crease the ration, and make it up
when normal conditions are restored.
The strain will be better borne if the
digestive system is relieved partly or
entirely, allowing the nervous energy
to be diverted to the bralu or nui
clea, as the case may be. if this he
not done the digestive system will h«
weakened, whereas by the othe
conrse it will be strengthened. There
Is no danger in the normal case In
entirely relieving the digestive and
eliminative system for hours or even
,A th°r°ugh understanding 0f
the philosophy of this conservation of
vitality with the increased confidence
and self-reliance that such understand
ing brings, is of great value Esn<v
cially important is it to the Pr0
fessional man who must often be sub
jected to great mental strain for long'
er or shorter periods, and to the ath
Iete, who must drop weight steadily
in any endurance test. You cannot
work brain or muscle to their fullest
capacity, and at the same time work
the digestive and eliminative system
to its limit, m
I have found, by experiments on
myself and others, that there is a loss
in weight of about a pound a day, dur
ing the first few days of a fast, when
little work is done. Now the de
mands of the system are supplied by
consumption of the tissues, and analv.
sis of the excreta and secretions
shows the proportions of the food els
ments required to sustain life. Add
ing for the work of digestion and
elimination and Increased work, we
get the estimate above given.
When intense mental work is being
done, there is an extraordinary waste
of phosphorus and albumen especially.
These can be supplied quickly without
great draft on vitality for digestion
and elimination, by eating flesh, fish
eggs and milk. These are quickly con
verted into force. But they are as
quickly expended, and thus produce
results equivalent to stimulation.
This is especially true of meat. Meat
contains the waste of the. animal sys
tem from which it was taken, particu
larly uric acid; and it has been fully
proved that the chief cause of fatigue
is the accumulation in the tissues of
waste, particularly uric acid. In all
the recent great tests of endurance
non-flesh eaters have excelled flesh
eating competitors. To the physiolo
gist familiar with the principles of
nutrition involved, it is as clear that
it should be so as that an engine
should run better on clean coal than
on coal and slate, of the same weight.
Sugar, especially fruit sugar, as in
prunes, dates, figs, dried currants
and oil (olive oil or peanut) are the
most economical sources of heat and
muscular energy. In athletic work
these will supply the extraordinary
waste of carbon with the least ex
penditure of vitality for digestion and
elimination. The articles of diet to
be most surely avoided in athletic
work, where long sustained effort is
required, are meat, white bread
(fresh), fried potatoes, pies, boiled
cabbage, pickles, beans, coffee, tea, al
cohol, cooked oysters, fish. If meat
“must" be eaten, let it be a little mut
ton or fresh white fish.
These suggestions apply equally to
the invalid, but each case requires
special consideration. Sugar, for in
stance, should be altogether omitted
in certain cases.
A food may show, on analysis,
a high nutritive value, yet may
require so much energy to digest
it to appropriate Its nutritive sub
stance and to eliminate its waste, that
the net profit may be little or noth
ing. There should be no hesitation
in preferring, for instance, olive oil
to cod liver oil. Meat digests more
easily in the stomach than does wheat
gluten, but digestion is not completed
in the stomach, and the elimination of
meat is much more expensive rhan
the elimination of entire wheat bread,
and—most important consideration
examination of the excreta from
meat shows a much greater number
of gerni3 (depending much on the
kind of meat) than the excreta from
bread, thus clearly indicating 'hat
meat is a much more active cause of
auto-intoxication than bread.
Boiled cabbage, again, is an expen
sive article of diet because it (boiled)
contains little or no nutritive elements
(hat the system can use, and it re
quires more energy to digest than
Dread.
i\UW lu ariaugc ex 3rtuaiav.i»i.'.
nomic dietary one must consider all
the facts in a given case. Tables of
food value, including digestibility. ar»
useful or not according as one under
stands them properly.
Following is a comparison of the
values of 12 principal foods reduced
to 'units of nutrition.” published by
our government, department of agri
culture, bulletin No. 25:
Skim milk .
Skim milk olieese.
Full milk.
Bacon .
Butter .
Veal .
Beef .
Peas .
Potatoes .
live Hour.
Rice .
Peanut meal.
Nutritive
units
per pound.
. !>-' 2
. S70.0
. 145.5
.1.257.7
.1,186.3
. 525.9
. 530.9
. 77S.6
. 138.2
. 603.6
. 534.6
.1,425.0
Cost per
1.000 units
in rents.
10.4
11.9
11.5
15.5
20.4
26.0
4.2
5.1
<0
10.0
3.0
In the foregoing paragraph is the
conclusion of the government «-\perts
as to the value or the peanut in com
parison with the other standard a:ti
des of diet commonly suppos d to h®
the most nutritious, showing the pea
nat to be the most economical of ail
foods. But it does not follow that one
should live on peanuts exclusively.
I receive many requests for advice
as io "how to live on peanuts. •' J
experiments have been conducted w
a view to determining the relative
values of foods, undei varying com j
tions of work, and in abnormal con'1
tions of healtli and growth. In 0D® 0
the experiments with peanuts "h11
accidentally became public, the e»='-B
tial fact demonstrated was that P®
nuts should not bo roasted and
the principle here involved has
highly important bearing upon 'ho ®
fects of cooking in genera^, irfclc®
have already considered.
(