Curtis's Junket

As a Senator from Kansas, Charles Curtis had fun, but not so much as other Senators. He worked hard, attended regularly, and after the death of Henry Cabot Lodge (1924) he became the G.O.P.'s busy Senate housekeeper. Now that he is Vice President, with high official rank and no official cares except to listen to the Senate when it is sitting and to hope for the health of President Hoover, things are different. Last week he slipped off to Miami Beach to "rest" and really have fun, his first real spree in years.

His host, Albert Davis Lasker, onetime (1921-23) chairman of the U. S. Shipping Board, took him to the Jockey Club races. As everyone knows, Indian-blooded Mr. Curtis used to be a jockey himself. He has an eye for fast horses the way some men have an eye for quick stocks. After the heat of the day it was cooling to return to Mr. Lasker's low, rambling white stucco villa (with rose tile roof) and listen to the Atlantic tapping on the sandy front lawn. Next door, like a Miamese twin, was the house of John D. Hertz, Yellow Cab tycoon. Mr. Hertz has a twin-motored Sikorsky in which the Vice President was tempted to take a fly.

With Carl G. Fischer he cruised to the

Cocolobo Bay Club, millionaire retreat on a Florida key. He met many Kansans at a reception given in his honor by S. B. Rohrer. old Topeka resident, now promoting real estate in Florida. He was the attraction that brought 300 men to another reception, at Harvey S. Firestone's.

The Vice President, as he had expected, found that the Florida sun helped the rheumatism from which he suffered.

No longer a Senator with a vote, but always a Grand Old Partisan, he said in an interview: "I am a tariff protectionist. I am sure the needs of the South will be given careful consideration in the drafting of the bill."