DOUBLE TAKE.

By Jerome Beatty Jr. '39.Brattleboro (Vt.): The Stephen GreenePress, 1971. Cartoons by Terence Parkes.120 pp. $3.95.

It's a mad world, my masters, but bloopers may change it, with laughter. By fishing out crazy things in newspapers and on signs, Mr. Beatty has produced a book and championed literacy and sanity. For his contribution to English literature he should be given a Char at the Fishmunger Institut for Piscotorical Lerning. He says that if you get a few laughs out of Double Cake, it will have been well worth the effrot. Keep your eyes pealed for this sort of hting. It makes life worth loving.

You adore little boys and girls? "Please drive carefully. Don't run over the children. Wait for Teacher." (Kansas). "Please take the lost children to the Lion House."

(Washington).

Fond of eating out? "Courteous, Efficient, Self-Service in Ann Arbor Cafeteria." Bronxville: "South African Lobster Tails. From the Clear Waters of the Caribbean." Akasaka, Japan: "All vegetables in this hotel were washed in water passed by the head chef."

Worried about ecology? "There is so much DDT in the human body that it is unfit for human consumption." (Kansas).

Concerned about office help? "How to Hire, Handle, and Hold Your Secretary." (Article in Management Methods).

Sensitive about undertakers? "Stop this inhuman embalming. Rent an electric refrigerated casket." (Illinois).

Opera lover? "To indicate that human love rises above nationality, Cho-Cho and officer wear tights only." (Tokyo Ballet Program for Madame Butterfly.)

Interested in sex? Card catalogue in Washington (State) Library: "SEX (see librarian)." After complaints about the taste of the wording, the card was changed to read: "SEX: (For sex ask at the desk.)" Georgia motel directory: "Honeymoon Suite $28. Each additional person $2." SanFrancisco Chronicle: "Abdollah Ranjbar, a 16-year-old Iranian farmer, divorced his 42 year old wife after 2 years of marriage and 18 children because she refused to produce a 19th child."

Movie fan? Advertisement in Paris-Soir: "The truth about Marilyn Monroe. Written by the Great American Journalist, Robert Frost."

London Express: "Rent. Hall with kitchen and toilet (can seat 100 persons) or could be converted into a dwelling place." Detroit Mission: "Jesus Saves. Hours 2 to 5."

It is indeed a mad world, my masters, when the New York Times has become so crazily biased: "But Wilbur Mills is beginning to see that poverty is an infectious disease, and so is the President;" and when the Public Library in Boston, the center of high culture, posts this sign: "Only Low Talk Permitted Here."