Letters, Jan. 12, 1942

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Sirs: Throughout the Chinese Empire there are thousands of Japanese engaged in subversive activities who are masquerading as true Chinese. Long residence in China and careful preparation for this role have equipped them so well that even the specially trained Chinese have difficulty in determining their true nationality. But once suspicious they employ a test that seldom fails. They take off the Chinese cloth slippers that the suspect invariably wears and examine his feet, paying particular and expert attention to ... the distance between! the great toe and its next neighbor. This telltale space is the result of wearing Japanese sandals which have a small strap between, the first and second toes. These sandals are never worn by Chinese and always by Japanese children during the period of development. CHRISS MARTINDALE Hot Springs, Ark.

Low Amperage

Sirs: Interesting is Dec. 15 TIME'S article ora welding, including development of rod-coating protection by Milwaukee's A. O. Smith Corp. But overlooked by TIME is another important development by Allis-Chalmers Manufacturing Co.-low amperage arc welding, which has opened hitherto closed fields to arc welders.

First to employ current as low as five amperes, it has made possible arc welding of materials as thin as 32-gage* and of aluminum and other light metals without heat discoloration or distortion. Low amperage for arc welding was obtained through revolutionary use of mercury vapor rectified tubes. Rapidly has this type of arc welding taken its place in the nation's vital aircraft industry because welding of all types of aircraft tubing is possible. Army and Navy Air corps, as well as the Civil Aeronautics Administration, have approved low-current arc welding. . . . WALTER GEIST Vice President Allis-Chalmers Mfg. Co. Milwaukee, Wis.

> TIME'S story in its brief compass did not undertake to cover all recent developments in welding. To Allis-Chalmers and several other companies goes credit for improvements of many kinds.—ED.

Line of the Year

Sirs: I submit my nomination for "the line of the year," the concluding sentence of the arti cle "Routine Declaration," TIME, Dec. 22: "Thus, as it must to all good peoples, war with the Nazis came to the U.S." JEROME SCHEUER Brookline, Mass.

"My Little Saw"

Sirs: TIME, Dec. 22: "Some misguided Washing ton patriot, unable to get at the Japs, emulated the Father of his Country and chopped down four of the lovely Japanese cherry trees along Washington's Tidal Basin."

No anti-Axis axman he,

Who sawed down that cherry tree.

Washington's feat, he could match it

If next time he'd use a hatchet.

Or had Washington told his irate paw,

"Dad, I did it with my little saw."

JOHN W. MCMURRAY JR. Springfield, Ill.

> To Reader McMurray and some 40 others who detected the work of a saw rather than a chopping instrument (see cut), a sugarplum for sharp-eyed scrutiny.—ED.