TAKE THE AIR

While all the publicity world bates its breath, a Diamond Queen and a Girl Lindbergh count one for the money, two for the show preparatory to passenger rides across the seas. Air rivalry, a duel of the clouds, is the motif seized upon by the fun--loving tabloids.

Diet, dress and demeanor of two desperately bold females in a moment become of head-line importance. Boom, boom go the Hearst syncopators. First class murders, Grade A scandals forth-with fade to the inside pages. The moans of the late Mr. Reading die away entirely.

Aerial news is now the breakfast stimulant of a nation. With four men blazing a path across the Western ocean and two triangular parties fighting for fame and vaudeville fortune in a race, no less, over the wearied airways of the Atlantic, the future of the featurists seems assured.

It is a profitable sport, while it lasts this intercontinental hopping. Two heroes who initiated the game have folded their wings and perched in prominent executive positions. An only semi-successful aviatrix has achieved silks and satins and the acclaim of America's girl glorifier. Others wear the badges of army-rank, possess the bank-accounts of Correspondence School successes, and appear weekly in the suburban newsreel.

Of the planes that rest in the North Atlantic ooze, or form a base for the architecture of the coral polyps of the Pacific, little is said. Nobile and the Italia are covered with an Arctic silence. The wreaths give place to the laurels.