Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 92.djvu/440

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��ropnlar Science Monthly

���to the floor. In a moment he faces the teller again, this time with consternation written on his face. "How did you do it?" he asks.

"Pretty soft," mockingly re- plies the teller, "All I had to do was to press a hidden elec- tric button under the desk with my knee. That little button caused a lifting device in the room adjacent to this to raise the receiver hook of a tele- phone. At the same time, a small-sized phonograph situ- ated in front of the telephone transmitter repeated the mes- age, "Help! Robbers! Send police to First National Bank!" Evidently the telephone girl heard it, for you were caught with the goods. By the way, you could have postponed your visit until to-night, but you would have been caught in the same manner."

��"Hands up!" commands the burglar, but the teller's knee presses against a button. A phonograph and telephone send out the necessary warning to the police

��How Our German Prisoners of War Amuse Themselves

��The Thief s "Hands Up!" Is An- swered by the Telephone's "Help!"

THE thief, face masked and pistol in hand, enters the bank and slinks up to the paying teller's window, "Hands up!" he commands. The teller does as he is ordered, sitting transfixed on his stool as the thief removes neat little piles of gold and silver from the win- dow. In three min- utes it is all over. The thief lowers his pistol, and, with the parting remark, "Pretty soft, old top," moves toward the door.

Hardly has he placed his hand on the knob before a dozen uniformed officers pin him fast

���An alligator shaped from a tree trunk. The teeth arc only sharpened wooden pegs

��GERMAN war prisoners, from the big German liner, Vaterland, are con- verting the large detention camp, located at Hot Springs, N. C, into a really pleasant place. They have built woodcraft houses to live in and made many curious and amusing things from materials gathered from woods and streams.

One of the curios- ities of the camp is a big alligator, emerging from a hole in the ground. This was shaped from an old tree- trunk. One of the prisoners, skilled in woodcraft, has con- verted the stump into a strikingly lifelike reptile, its open mouth showing a double row of vicious teeth.

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