Chicago Tribune from Chicago, Illinois • 49

Pages 49 to 56 PART SIX. SEPTEMBER 16, 1900-SIXTY PAGES. WOMEN ARMED WIT FAVORITE WEAPONS. WOMAN HAS PET WEAPONS. SOLDIERS ON SCANT FARE.

That to Grabs First Thing Comes to Hand Hit Man. Two Troops in Oklahoma Testing a New Emergency Ration. PREFERS A BROOM. FOOD IS A SUCCESS. Police Records Show That Her Favorite with Knives Second.

Preliminary Experiments Show the Capsules Will Sustain Life. QUICK AND EFFECTIVE. WATCHED BY ARMIES. has long been acknowledged by men In all walks of life that a woman as a physical antagonist is more to be feared than a man. In this fear there Is a certain deep-seated recognition In the man that in such a contest he ha3 a certain handi IDINO across the prairies of Oklahoma today, without any objective point ln view aave a time and distance mark, are twa troops of United States cavalry, led by Captain Fountain of the.

Eighth and Captain Foster ol JO iJyj cap of conventionality; that he can-tot strike out as he would were his an-eallant a man. Even the victim of the strong-arm amazon of the levee has paid this tribute to the sex. But now, for the first time. The Tribune fcas undertaken to show that in her choice of weapons and in the conceded ability that she has for using most of them a Chicago woman on the warpath cannot be granted those little gallant considerations that an unarmed man In for a trouncing might ordinarily be disposed to give her. As shown by police records of a year In Chicago her life is circumscribed by a veritable arsenal of her own.

As weapons of offense and defense the list stands. In the order of utility: WOMAN'S MANY WEAPONS. Erooa handles IBS Table knives' of all kinds ..103 "Stove-lid lifters 79 Soiling pins 78 Plates and dishes 73 Hatpins 65 Hair brashes and hand mirrors 43 Xops 33 81 Flatirons 29 Curling irons 12 Umbrellas and parasols 11 Shoes and slippers 9 Scissors 8 Forks 6 Books 4 Potato mashers Siding whips 3 lamp i Nursing bottle 1 Last and least numerous on the list Is the cursing bottle, but from the success of that Instrument coming In contact with an unruly husband's skull a few days ago, the Police department expects It to have a great run with womankind In the next year. It is a handy weapon, nearly always loaded, and when it has stunned the enemy It Is likely to cut into his scalp, and then, as a last indignity, drench him with a clothes-spoiling shower of greasy liquid At its first trial in a family dispute on the North 8Me the other day the husband dropped while the wife counted eight and one-half. Then he got up and said he guessed he didn't have any more to say on the Bubject under discussion until he could take a bath.

By that time his anger had cooled sufficiently for him to decide on having his wife arrested for assault. As the justice dismissed the case next day, it looks as if the loaded surslng bottle will be at the other end of THINGS WOMEN USED AS WEAPONS. FROM POLICE COURT RECORDS. Broom handles 89 Table knives of all kinds 102 Stove-lid lifters 79 Rolling pins 76 Plates and dishes 72 Hatpins 65 Hair brushes and hand mirrors 48 women have mixed things with a rldiny whip between them, complexion specialist have a run on their lotions. To poll th other woman's beauty usually is the Intent of tho attacking person, and few things will do this more effectively than a whip.

It Is painful, tbo, in superlative degree. Of the emergency weapons for the street, the hat pin leads by all odds. It was used) fifty-five times in the last year anil no one will question Its effectiveness ln any emergency. It is dramatic ln Its possibilities. It is the American stiletto and it has the advantage over the Italian weapon In that It has not yet been' Classed with As an article of dress it is not well adapted to use.

It is to hat and hair alike, but its readiness as a weapon promises to keep It In the dresser of every boudoir. West Side police still talk of a hat pin duel between women-a few years ago. In which one of the contestants was stabbed deeply In the neck. Only a few weeks ago a young woman, named Mary Rilley, attacked Sergeant Timothy Culllnan with a hat pin as he stood at the desk In the East Chicago Avenue Station. Only the prompt Interference of a patrolman standing near by saved him.

All of this goes to show that If women are not discriminating fighters at all times, they are'at least versatile in their choice of weapons. The nursing bottle departure is full of promise that their ingenuity in selection has not reached Its limit. There is a great field still open to this talent in emancipated women. That they will recognize It and rise to its opportunities must be taken for granted by every sensible married man. TRAGIC TALE OF AN INTAGLIO.

33 31 29 12 1 1 9 8 4 3 3 1 1 Mops Revolvers 1. Flatirons Curling irons I Umbrellas and parasols Shoes and slippers Scissors Forks Books. Potato mashers Riding whips Nursing bottle the Fifth Cavalry. Doubtless at least once within the hou each trooper takes a reef In his saber belt, and doubtless also at each halting placo he envies his horse the full ration of oats with which it Is served. The men may be hungry, but if they succeed in making theii march without sickness and without no-ticable loss of strength they will have solved a problem which has puzzled military authorities Blnce armies first took the field.

These soldiers of Uncle Sam are testing a new emergency ration called in army parlance the Iron ration. The idea is to find out if the condensed food which they are carrying with them has sufficient sustaining powers to keep men in good fighting trim for a week. The rations take up but little space, food sufficient for a day not occupying more than a few square Inches. In Mew of past failures with rations of somewhat similar nature the two Captains who are leading the expedition. In connection with another army officer.

Colonel Dempsey, experimented upon themselves with the food. For four days they ate absolutely nothing but that which was contained ln small capsule-like arrangements and which came ln bites no bigger than a button. At the end of the four days the officers declared that thy felt In good physical condition, and this, notwithstanding the fact that while they were living on the Lilliputian meals, they kept up an amount of exercise equal to that which they would have been called on to undergo had they been campaigning. HAS PROVED A SUCCESS. For the first time ln the histories of the armies of the nations a condensed emergency ration has been pronounced an unqualified success.

If it prove to satisfy the physical needs of 100 men as it did of the three it will be put Into the haversack of very one of Uncle Sam's soldiers now in the field, as well as Into that of the soldier of every civilized nation, provided his government can learn the secret of Its make. The value of the Iron ration lies ln th fact that a supply for a considerable length of time can be carried on the person without any inconvenience. An army furnished with It can, if necessary, cut loose from Its base of supplies for some days together. Wounded soldiers necessarily left behind by their commands If not badly hurt may hii themselves from the enemy and live upon the contents of their haversack for days. Scouting parties may start on expeditions without giving a thought to the question of foraging for food.

PREVIOUS RATIONS DEFECTIVE. About five years ago the War department thought it had an emergency ration that was as near perfect as could be obtained. In theory the food was all right, but the Instan that it was put to the test it was found wanting. A large contingent of Infantrymen started on a march through Colorado for the purpose of trying the ration. Before the expedition was over the men almost without exception had been on sick report, and when they returned to the garrison most of them went to the hospital Instead of to the barracks.

In that ration was contained desiccated beef, one ounce of which was supposed to make a satisfying soup for a. doztn men. In addition there were condensed onions, potatoes, carrots, and other vegetables. Included also were small buttons of tea and coffee, each button when dissolved making a cup of the beverage for one soldier. This ration was a dead failure.

With it went beef tea la capsules. Army authorities declare that there is absolutely no nutriment in beef tea. This statement has the backing of many eminent medical authorities, but It does not accord well wltb many btef tea advertisements. The army people go so far as to declare that no matter If a man had an unlimited quantity of the article at hU command he would starve to death on beef tea. A direct quotation from a report Is this: Nothing remains but the stimulating qualities of the beef; the nour-iphment is left in the boiler." ENGLISH USE PEMMICAN.

The English army ln south Africa usei what Is called pemmlcan. It was far from satisfying and sustaining, but it was better In Its results than many emergency rations. The method of Its preparation Is a secret, but Its constituents are known to beef, fat, and salt. Germany not long ago spent a large sura of money In the manufacture of biscuits containing meat and flour. One small cracker was supposed to contain nutriment enough to give a man a satisfying dinner.

The money expended was thrown away. The German soldiers, usually absolutely obedient, refused to eat the ration. A4 a matter of fact, they could not eat it, for their stomachs rebelled against it. The present German emergency ration Is what Is known as a pea sausage. It is composed of peameal, fat, and bacon.

There is a secret process by which the sausige is prepared so that It will remain good for an indefinite period. One sausage will make twelve plates of soup. The ration is far from being an backs are almost certain to fly apart. the leaves to spread and flutter, until finally when the blow lands It is a good deal like getting a broadside from a Japanese fan. One unabridged dictionary was thrown In Chicago, however.

It fell short, as It happened, but its possibilities are such that it might be well to have them put on racks and chained down after the fashion of a city directory ln a drug store. The parlor is the ideal sitting-room for a family, but too often it is kept closed, with blinds drawn on a damp, musty smell that needs nothing quite so much as ventilation. Given the parlor as a sittlrg-room and lear-lng the wife to choose the mantel bric-a-brac regardless of Its cost, a husband may find a safety there that would be impossible of realization anywhere else in the house. In all the list of missiles thrown by women last year ln Chicago there was not one parlor ornament. Wives of the most hasty temper never throw Rookwood pottery nor Sevres vases, no matter what the provocation.

Little ormolu clocks are among the safest home decorations In the world. Even a Japanese wooden mask, with real teeth in it, is harmless to a remarkable degree. IN THE STREET. In the street woman's weapons as drawn against an offending outside world are of two classes the weapon of a studied, deep-seated revenge, and that of an emergency, in which the woman sails into an offending anatomy in the abandon of fury. The revolver belongs to the first class, end is alone in it.

A woman who shrieks at a baby firecracker on July 4 will go man-hunting or woman-hunting with a forty-five caliber revolver under her apron as if she had been brought up to target practice at Sandy Hook proving She may not know a rlm-flre cartridge from a police whistle, or whether a revolver trigger should be pulled with a forefinger or a thumb. But when the time for'action comes she can empty a six-chamber revolver rather faster than the garbage pan ln the kitchen sink. Records of the past year show that she is not a good shot. But all the testimony of the courts is to the effect that she can pull the trigger on a young cannon without blinking an eye. USE FOR WHIPS.

The riding whip occupies a half way place between the revolver and the emergency weapons for public use. Oddly enough, it is almost always used on another woman. Woman may be Incensed at a man beyond measure and yet be content to wallop him with a parasol In a soft roll. But ln the case of an offending female a riding whip, leaving long, livid welts in its track. Is Invariably selected unless the offense calls for the use of the revolver.

When two offense. A few weeks ago a woman struck her husband across the face with the brush side of one of these wire Instruments, and he kept Indoors for days for fear of being carted off to the isolation hospital. The stiff wires buried their points in his face until smallpox by comparison would have seemed a minor infection. The curling Iron, unless it be hot at the time, is more or less ineffective. Used as a club It lacks weight and sweep.

To thrust it dagger-fashion into the solar plexus is one of the most telling blows possible to it- A glancing blow on the sternum, half circling a lean rib, is a most painful thrust. A clever man may sidestep it, but If the hot out of a gas jet it is an ugly thing to guard, especially if the man be in the deshabille of a sleeveless undershirt. SHOES AND SLIPPERS. Shoes and slippers may be laughed at. French heel is bad, of course, but a man may close In on the aggressor in all confidence and reduce the whole situation to a rough and tumble mix up.

Scissors are distinctly bad. They are Just awkward enough for a woman to do unexpected execution with them. With yawning blades, more or less septic from snipping the myriad things of a household, from toenails to a cloth at the kitchen sink, they make an ugly wound that is slow to heal. In a good many households it might be well for the husband before going to bed to dip the shears In the dresser into a disinfectant consisting of sixteen drops of carbolic acid to one quart of boiled water. This solution may be kept in an Aztec water bottle, serving as an ornament when not in use.

The nursing bottle completes the bedroom armory. Too much emphasis cannot be laid upon its effectiveness. The bottle with tho plain nipple, instead of with the tubes of glass and rubber, promises to be most popular. The dangling tube is most likely to catch in something in making a swing, breaking the force of a blow, ln the recent North Side case some of the broken glass fell on the baby, it is said, injuring It slightly about the face. With a little use of the bottle as a weapon, however, the wife will learn to see that her husband is out of range of the crib before she strikes.

A bit of netting stretched over the little one would prove a happy preventive only that it would make seizing the bottle a good deal more difficult for the mother. Water in the mtlk, by reason of its greater specific gravity, tends to make the nursing bottle more dangerous, and fathers cannot be too careful In seeing to it that they are getting the rich, light Jersey milk so widely advertised and so seldom sold in Chicago. The library is an excellent place for a family sitting-room, and as such is second only to the parlor. Books are bad weapons, though frequently used. When thrown the Memorial of a Girl's Drowning It Has Caused Suicide of Two Men.

threw not only the soup tureen but the half gallon of soup that was in it straight at her husband's shirt front. Hot coffee is thrown in teacup hand grenades, and, altogether, the dining-room muss is ugly enough without the lamp. But one lamp was thrown In Chicago last year, bringing out both the Police and Fire departments, with an ambulance on the side. Whether lighted or not, the lamp Is one of the ugliest of domestic missiles, and Its target smells bad for a long time. In nine case out of ten in the police records of the country the woman throws It at her husband, ln the hope of collecting both the life and the fire Insurance policies.

Tassing from the dining-room group of missiles the bedroom list Is next ln rank and below the other one in effectiveness. These, likewise, are implements of domestic discord. They come into play when a sleepy husband refuses to walk the floor with baby or to get up in the dusKy gray of a winter morning and touch a match to the kindling in the kitchen range. IN THE BEDROOM. Hair brushes and hand mirrors lead this division.

As between them there Is small choice in effectiveness, though if the wife be at all superstitious the possibility of breaking the mirror should be a deterrent to its use. The wire hair brush really Is an ugly weapon, though its effect on the hair is such that it is passing out of use in the toilet. Only a few are still preserved as weapons of list of woman's weapons this time next rear. FIRST WEAPON AT HAND. Matter-of-fact policemen, who deal with women offenders against the peace, say that woman's long string of weapons of aggression comes from the fact that In anger or in fright she seizes hold of the object nearest at hand, seldom depending on her fists, and mly infrequently upon her nails.

They hold In an emergency a woman with a nutmeg grater at her right hand and a revolver In the next room would seize the grater as a weapon nine times out of a possible ten. At the same time, however, they admit that there may be method in it. A revolver Is an uncertain quantity for many reasons, hile a nutmeg grater drawn across a man's eyes would be most likely to put him out of a fight. HYSTERIA NOT BRAVERY. The psychologist declares that in emergencies that prompt a woman to defend herself she seldom shows a true bravery.

It is hysteria, rather. She sets her teeth, shuts both eyes, and goes into a fray with a blind abandon that has no reason behind It. It is this disposition that is especially embarrasses to the burglar. He surprises a woman who is away from any one weapon of her arsenal, but she never falters. She springs at him with hysterical fury, seizes him, and begins to hang on till the cows come home.

He can't shake her loose, and a thousand years of heredity are against his striking her with a crowbar. So, screeching like a tearn siren, the Chicago woman clings like poison Ivy to an oak and In a year captures uearly as many burglars as do the plain aothes men who hibernate at corner saloons. But women's weapons are not often used on burglars. They are devoted to husbands, other men's wives, tramps, and things like that, and so nicely is natural selection preserved in this choice of weapons that an eld policeman, seeing the weapon used wrlt-'So down in the arrest-book, can guess pretty closely to what the trouble was all about and who got whipped. As a woman's weapon the broom handle always was and probably always will be first.

In the fiction of the comic papers the roIHng-pin has the prestige, but when it comes to hard, police fact the rolling-pin fives place to the broom handle, knife, and Ufter for the stove lids. BROOMHANDLE LESS EFFECTIVE The broom handle never has been classed to deadliness. Time was when it was fcuch more effective than it is now, for the reason that it was of firm wood, straight train, and free from knots and blemishes. Eut the broom handle has deteriorated with the forests of the North; it Is to the broom handles of long ago as the present match is the old eight-day sulphur-headed arti-c-e that would tumble chickens off a roost its fumes. Tet the fact that lSfi assaults were made broom handles in 1S99 indicates that it yd 5s its heyday.

As a weapon it is used 'ter the manner of a billiard cue, or with a sweeping side stroke that can only be Eot sie-stepped. Swung in a Cf cle' with a free arm movement, DIAGRAM SHOWING RELATIVE POPULARITY OF WOMEN'S WEAPONS. BROOMMANOUE.5 a patrol wagon load of policemen, and an angry woman with one of them is scarcely less disconcerting. STOVE-LID LIFTERS. The stove-Hd lifter is as a two-edged sword in its effectiveness.

It is heavy, the business end of it Is nearly always hot, and it has jagged iron ears that correspond to the old knotted cluba of our ancestors," when mankind was newly made and preferred to kill his enemy at close range. Next to this is the rolling pin, a formidable weapon in the hands of even a sylph. Carried concealed about the person, any man with a rolling pin in his pocket could be tried for premeditated murder and run a desperate risk of being convicted. It is woman's own weapon, however, and arrests seldom are made because of its use, unless brain fever Is a result. For this reason the seventy-six case3 listed by the police must not be taken as any more complete than the school board regards the Chicago census.

Men struck with a rolling pin have described the sensation as like unto the blow of a trip-hammer, followed by the Milky Way's letting go of cosmos and spilling down in fiery showers upon the world. Tnen a long, black, silent blank succeeds; then numbed consciousness and the smells of camphor and arnica. SLOSH OF THE MOP. Mop sticks are used brush-end foremost. They are humiliating agents, rather than dangerous ones.

The slushing, sloshing slop of a floor cloth, soaked in dirty suds, has always been regarded as worse than falling into the South Branch of the Chicago River before the bear-trap dam was raised. If a man is not knocked out his eyes and mouth are too full of suds for anything else to interest him. Unable tosee and unable to talk, his only recourse Is to roll down the back steps and feel for the alley gate. The potato masher closes the list that may be termed the kitchen group. It Is not as dangerous as it may appear to be.

"iears ago some one who had mashed his potatoes with the blade of his knife for twenty years discovered that he could do the job much better with a fork. A Yankee took the trick and made a wire potato masher that has replaced In large measure the masher of the Indian club pattern of long ago. Hence the man who is struck by a modern woman using a potato masher usually gets away with only a few scratches and some bits of warm potato In his eyes. It is in the backwoods districts principally where deaths continue to follow Its use. This kitchen group of weapons are used largely at the back door.

The tramp, the peddler, the iceman, the laundryman. and the milkman are most familiar with them. Sometimes they are raised against the bad boy in the next flat and infrequently against a scandal-mongering neighbor who uses the same back porch. But they are not widely practical In family rows. The nearer one gets to the front parlor the more adaptable the furnishings of the house become to Internecine strife.

DINING-ROOM WEAPONS. In the dining-room group Is a little world of domestic tragedy, growing wider as one moves toward the bedroom. Think of plates and other dishes figuring seventy-two times In the court records of Chicago in a single year. Not long ago, to cite an Individual instance, a West Side wife ANEW YORK artist is the possessor of an Intaglio which has a peculiarly tragic history. Two of Its former owners have committed suicide because of influences more or less directly connected with the fate of the unfortunate girl whose death mask was the model of the sculpture.

The present owner, however, is more artistic than sentimental or superstitious and has no fears that he will imitate the two previous possessors of the Intaglio. Not many years ago an artist of more than local reputation was living in Boston. He had an only daughter, a beautiful girl with many graces which would have made her a still more lovely woman. But, Uke the girl Hood sang about, she was rashly importunate." and to end her sorrows she drowned herself in the bay. The artist father, though keenly sensitive to the great grief, still noted how artistically beautiful the girl was in death.

He made a death mask, from which the intaglio was made. But the face haunted him. Those classic lines, representing his daughter as she appeared floating in the waters of the bay, her eyes closed and her hair floating like a mermaid's, seemed to lure him to follow her. He reflected on her life and her sadder fate; how it might have been because of his own sternness that she had destroyed her young life, and how ln a large measure he might be responsible for her destruction. The thoughts became unbearable and he drowned himself In the bay at the identical spot where Jhe beautiful girl had gone to her fate.

The artist's wife could not bear to have the intaglio near her and gave It to a New Tork friend. The friend was not superstitious, but her husband was a sporting man who lost and won with the reckless abandon of men of his kind. Naturally he was a firm believer In luck, and the marble features of that beautiful face had a strange infatuation for him. He knew something of the history of both the girl and her father. He mused over the sculpture, grew despondent, and finally ended ail by drowning himself.

The widow of the sporting man was not superstitious, but after the death of her husband, and knowing the fate cf the girl and the artist, she was willing to part with her treasure. The present owner as an artist admires the bit of marble and as a lover of the strange and curious prizes it for Its story. Didn't Pay the Cabman. He had just got home at 3 in the morning after a long drive. Stop a bit.

cabman." he said. Ton must wait until I bring a light. I've dropped a $10 bill somewhere in the bottom of your cab." The cabman drove off furiously put be fllda't find, tbe money. row. UPTC.

79 POTATO tlAHtRi RIDING. whip 3 ii i i it PLATES 71 ideal one, because it has not sufficient HAT PINS SS (J I Ak 1 ti AM ml pi m' ii ii I i i SI 1 ill I 1 JUAT IRON 19 strength-giving qualities. It could not be used in the American army, because not one of Uncle Sam's soldiers could be hired; to eat It. The French have an Iron ration that Is but little more than bread, but in certain ways it is more satisfying than any other condensed food ever tried for its particular purpose. In order that a man may feel as though he has had something to eat his stomach must be distended.

The French take a little piece of dough-like material and dip it in hot water. In a few mometts it gets to be as big as a loaf of bread. It Is perhaps not too much to say that army authorities are watching the result of the Oklahoma experiment with as much. Interest as they watched the first trials of smokeless powder, a substance which afterward revolutionized the methods of wax-, fare all over the world. ii ilk uetn cescriDea by victl tms as into a to running hare-snd-hounds stretched taut I Ik I I Ll i mm aW I i i I 1 1 1 I i i kJLA i rvv rwv a ia hi til if imm.

1 I II ffil'lfl JJ I I' II W.1 Aca fm knife in the hands of woman may or arrt dangerous, owing to its make mL Eree ot lts Eharpness. One of the most dangerous weapons in the world is 1 French kltchen knife. When uc w. ln 3 htel "rant runs ck with one of these knives they call.