Cord's Oath (Concluded)

Sirs:

Allow me to add my protest to A. M. Hos-singer's in the matter of your printing Mr. Cord's oath.

I am a great admirer of TIME. have not missed reading a copy since the first issue; but this sort of thing repels me. . . .

Is it really good editorial policy to make a fetish of accurate reporting? How many dozens, or hundreds, of current events teachers do you suppose have rejected TIME for the same reason I did?

Don't be ''hardboiled."

JOHN C. GREEN JR.

Glen Cove, N. Y.

TIME views hardboiledness with alarm, nevertheless cannot ignore the considerable fraction of the contemporary scene which is hardboiled. As to "fetish": if TIME had one, it could be none other than accurate reporting. As to current events, TIME competes only for the favor of those who are prepared to encounter any and all facts.--ED. Sirs I hereby order you to stop sending your publication to my home -- 7 Webster Road, East Milton, Mass. . . . Any publisher who will gloat over the lan guage used in your issue of Feb. 1 (p. 4) is not deserving of the support of decent people, and I forbid your publication coming into my home. . . . TILTON S. BELL

Sirs:

Gee, I like the way your magazine clicked on young Mr. Cord. This human dynamo deserves everything you said about him. As far as some bluenoscs giving your rag the quit, you know this is a lot of bologny. This reason, well, where would they get the news as TIME gives it to them. ''Try and get it.'' A little dynamic expression will not harm the best of us. In fact, there is a lot of us that need a stick of dynamite set off under us these days.

H. MAYBERRY Pittsburgh, Pa.

But let Subscriber Mayberry note well that TIME uses no slang word in its reporting of the news unless there is no synonym in good usage.--ED. Sirs: . . . Personally, I don't see how a man can be accurately described in print, unless some of the things he does, the expressions that he uses, are outlined. . . . There are five people (over 21) besides myself, who read my copy of TIME, and they all agree that TIME is "a -- -- wow"-- (not used with the permission of the copyright owners). Louis NELSON

Roxbury, Mass.

Sirs:

TIME is my intellectual staff of life. Without it I would be mentally dead in these days of confusion. While in camp in Colorado last summer, I actually walked two miles and back to Denver on three successive Saturdays to get a copy of TIME, and I am no longer young. Hut never before have I felt like kissing the editor on both cheeks as when I read in the current issue his matchless rejoinder to a supercilious fanatic anent the use of an innocuous expletive. It served him right, for he betrays a mentality which even TIME can never hope to enlighten.

In this connection, allow me to express my keen admiration of your masterly sketch of the outstanding Democratic candidate for the Presidency. . . .

CHARLES W. TAFFLOW

Riverdale, Md.

Here ends the Cord Oath controversy. TIME is grateful for support and criticism of its policy, and repeats its promise to cause the minimum of offense in respect to newsworthy oaths.--ED. St. Gandhi's Teeth

Sirs:

1 like to see questions fought to a finish in your Letters column. You seem to have most minute information concerning the daily habits of Gandhi. In your own reply to Mr. Beals in the Feb. 1 issue, you describe how St. Gandhi cleans his teeth with a dantan. Perhaps he does, but if so he must hold them in his hand for tin-cleaning process. That is if Sherwood Eddy is the accurate observer that I judge him to be. For Mr. Eddy in his recent book The Challenge of the East writes as follows: ''We remember him again as we sat beside him at meal time.

. . He appeared to have just one tooth in his upper jaw. We noticed that Bapuji . . . would take from a bowl an artificial set of teeth to manage the scientific mastication of his breakfast. If he were to retain them during the day he would look younger and better than he really does. ... So we notice that he left his artificial dentistry for its strictly scientific use at the next meal, and went on his way a smiling, toothless old man." Can TIME'S correspondent arrange to count St. Gandhi's teeth (or tooth) and settle this one? . . .

C. E. POTTER

Connersville, Ind.

St. Gandhi has three teeth (two upper incisors, one lower left center). He keeps them clean by the dantan, also necessary for tongue-cleansing, as explained by TIME. Eating no meat, he uses his false teeth on few occasions.--ED. Dickey Underbid

Sirs:

Dr. Herbert Spencer Dickey (TIME, Oct. 19) intrepid explorer, valiant promoter, is to be applauded for his share in helping deliver the interior of South America into the hands of ''dudes." Ma)' his expensive collection of them see many Jivaros. shoot many monkeys. . .

It is time that the ''dude'' class of North

America (usually intelligent, travel-wise, fully aware of the unquestioned joy of getting really off the beaten path) knows what South America has to offer. It is also time that South Americans know another type of tourist than the one which religiously fails to survive the daily cocktail hour, snorts ceaselessly at the embryonic plumbing, and tries to carve his initials on the Lima cathedral. From the Andes to the Atlantic, northern South America offers: the world's largest untamed (but travel-easy) wilderness, peerless hunting, excellent fishing, real but tractable savages, colorful waterways and jungle paths, and altogether, the most vivid and exotic primitive scene left in this age. . . .

I receive the comments of many "dudes" at first hand for mine is just about the first real dude-ranch in South America.

I do think that Dr. Dickey's $5,000 fee for the trip across the Andes and down the Amazon is excessive: rather it is trading upon the glamour of the tropics for the uninitiated. I'll guarantee the same trip and conditions for less than half of thai: I happen to live right on the trail.

RICHARD C. GILL

Banos, Ecuador

Dr. Dickey who sailed last week with four dude paying-companions, said he could have offered the trip at $1.000. But he offered luxuries--airplane rides, outboard motors, the backing of the State Department. Let less luxury-minded dudes dicker with Duderancher Gill.--ED. "It Isn't Always So"

Sirs: My father, the late Daniel E. Hervey, worked on the editorial staff of several New York papers for years and one of his pet hobbies was writing a short column of "If you see it in the Sun it isn't always so." "If you see it in the Sun" was Dana's pet caption. I have inherited his hobby and recently took you to task when you called citizens of Caracas, Venezuela, something other than Caracanians. One of your editorial staff wiggled out of that one but this time I have you right. In TIME, Feb. 1. you say that the normal blood pressure of a man Mayor Walker's age is 150--p. 10 footnote col. 3. You are just about 20 years behind time and I am ashamed of you. When the sphygmomanometer was first discovered, medicine figured a person's blood pressure at 100 plus his age. That was found inaccurate and now it is figured at So this his age. Let me see how you wiggle out of this one. WALLWYN HERVEY

(M.D., D.D.S.) New York City

TIME, no wiggler, stands corrected. --ED. Blood Pressure Sirs:

I wish to correct your footnote relative to the blood pressure of Mayor Walker, in which you state that the normal blood pressure for a man aged 50 is 150 (TIME, Feb. 1). There has been very general misinformation regarding what the blood pressure should be at the different ages, and the following table gives the normal systolic readings:

Age Average,

10-15 yr. 118 Mm Hg.

15-30 " 122

30-40 " 127

40-50 " 130

50-60 " 132

60-65 " 138

. . . The old rule of 100 plus the age has long since been superseded.

H. A. BAKER

Medical Director Kansas City Life Insurance Co. Kansas City, Mo.

For information anent the repeal of an old rule, thanks.--ED. In South Carolina

Sirs:

I raise a voice in shrill protest over TIME'S chronicling of the recent Automobile Show at New York (TiME, Jan. 18).

The news of the show was the values offered, rather than the gadgets. . . .

Particularly true was this of the fine car exhibits, and notably that of Fierce-Arrow. . . . Fierce-Arrow introduced a Twelve at the New-York Show that crowded the Eight for spot-light honors . . . and earned mention accordingly. However, failing this, perhaps TIME will not overlook a further example of automotive integrity as testified to in the accompanying voluntary letter from a gentleman of the far South.

H. S. BISHOP

The Fierce-Arrow Motor Car Co.

Buffalo, N. Y.

Wrote the Southern gentleman:

I am attaching hereto a picture of a Fierce-Arrow. After 28 years of service, it is in good mechanical condition and will do 15 m. p. h., which is all that was expected of her at the time of manufacture. My only trouble now is getting the Highway Department of South Carolina to issue a license tag in order that I can operate on the public highways. CHARLES KNOTT

City Manager Beaufort, S. C.

Rapture v. Nightmare

Sirs:

Re: your Feb. 1 issue, p. 4, communication signed by one Joshua Sarasohn: "Either you make those broadcasts less dramatic, or else Steve goes to bed at 8 on Fridays hereafter."

There are enough programs on the air catering to physical and mental 7-year-olds. Please do not for one moment consider the alternative of reducing your program to that common denominator. Let the 7-year-old under discussion retire to bed.

Incidentally, my boys, 8 & 10, sit in enraptured and absolute silence during your broadcast. The only effect it has upon them is to stimulate their minds so that they lead their grades at school, especially in Current Events, etc. It seems to me this positive reaction should more than offset one child's nightmares.

MRS. WILLARD SPORLEDER

Calumet City, Ill.

--The objectionable word has been deleted just as such words are invariably deleted from TIME whenever they are not essential to the story.--ED.

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