Knives And Tomahawks

Knives and Tomahawks.

John Chalmers, the missionary friend of Robert Louis Stevenson, and every inch a man, once telegraphed to England: "Getting in trim for next season. Ask Jones send one gross tomahawks; one gross butchers' knives. Going east; try make friends between tribes."

London was convulsed over the missionary's peculiar way of promoting friendship with the New Guinea cannibals, says a writer in the Rochester Post-Express. Chalmers had learned that no other two articles were so likely to do this. The knife and the tomahawk were popular for purposes of barter among people who would have had no use for copies of the "Encyclopedia Britannica" or its from a fashion magazine. The telegram was incongruous only to the ignorant.