The White House Week

P: Lieutenant Commander Byrd, looking weather-beaten, stood before a cheering assemblage of ambassadors and ministers of many nations, Supreme Court justices, cabinet members, congressmen, scientists and high officers of the Army and Navy. He received the welcome and congratulations of President Coolidge, who also presented him with a gold medal from the National Geographic Society.

P: Virginians in the audience shuddered when the President mispronounced Commander Byrd's middle name "Evelyn," as "Evalyn" instead of the traditional "Evelyn" demanded in the recipient's home state.

P:The President awaited serenely the adjournment of Congress, smug and trim in the cool White House. He told Reporters that he enjoyed the lassitudinous Washington climate during July and August. However, he added, he believed in getting away for a little while, if only for the sake of change in environment, that, if the Capitol were in the Adirondacks, he would leave just the same. News arrived, simultaneously with the President's announcement, that one Andrew Bishop, who lives near the Coolidge summer camp, had frozen his ears on a frosty night last week.

P:T John Coolidge arrived early in the week from a visit at his grandmother's, Mrs. Elmira Goodhue of Northampton, Mass. Another day among the President's callers was one Alberto Salomon, Peruvian, who told of wealth in Peru. The President was impressed with the growing importance of South American countries, expressed the wish that John learn Spanish next year at Amherst.

P:It is not an unusual thrill to Washington gentry to touch the elbow of Mrs. Coolidge while she shops in a crowded department store, or to see her as she walks along the sunny avenue. Frequently she sorties unattended. Last week it was fortunate that her son, John, was at her arm when she snagged her heel in the pavement in front of the White House, slipped, nearly fell, before he caught her.

P:The President at last rid his mind of appointments to the U. S. Tariff Commission and the new Railway Mediation Board. For the Commission he found a suitable farmer, Sherman J. Lowell of Fredonia, N. Y., onetime National Grange president; and Edgar B. Brossard of Utah, already serving on the Commission under a recess appointment. To the Board he added Carl Williams, Oklahoma Democrat, farmer, stockman, editor. The other railway mediators: Representatives Samuel E. Winslow of Massachusetts; onetime Senator Edwin P. Morrow of Kentucky; Gloss-brenner W. W. Hanger of Illinois, public member of the old Railway Labor Board; Hywel Davies, mediator for the Department of Labor.