Nip

A squabble last week arose over a drink of brandy. The Vitaphone Co. and one John T. Adams were in court; Mr. Adams battling for $1,250 which he feels Vitaphone owes him as part of a $15,000 salary as musical director. Mr. Adams fed Mary Lewis stimulant in a teacup, so ran the testimony, and her resulting record of the Barcarole (Tales of Hoffman) showed voice strain, was worthless.

Called to witness, Miss Lewis, famed onetime chorus girl who is now an opera soprano, said she had been cold. All day she had been sitting in the studio in the scanty beads and satin of Lady Giulietta. The slinky costume of a courtesan is not designed for stage waits. "Chilled, depressed, exhausted," she complained. Gallant, Mr. Adams sent for brandy. Grateful, Miss Lewis drank. Warmed, she sang. Ousted, Mr. Adams is suing for his salary.

Court reserved decision.

Next day Sport Writer Williams of the New York Evening Tele-grunt meditated gravely on teacups and the apparent discrepancies between opera and sports arena. Mr. Williams distinctly recalled a recent prizefight in which Michael McTigue lost the light-heavyweight championship to Thomas Loughran (TIME, Oct. 17), chiefly, according to Mr. Williams, because, Mr. McTigue waited until the last rest between rounds to "toss off" a teacup of something. He recalled Rube Wadell, baseball pitcher, who sat over his teacups all one night before his pitching masterpiece--a game against Detroit in which Ty Cobb, first man up, bunted safely, and thereafter no man reached first base. He recalled Golfer J. Douglas Edgar, of England, who preferred steins, which, when available, dropped his score a dozen strokes. He recalled Papyrus, horse, who performed fastest with buckets of ale in his belly. These examples proved to Mr. Williams a principle. He mourned for Mr. Adams & Mary Lewis, grieving that the principle had not been properly applied.

/-Vitaphone is the most successful of all devices for the joint reproduction of motion pictures and sound. Famed artists recording for Vitaphone: Marion Talley, Al Johson, Elsie Janis, Mischa Elman.