LETTERS: Cleopatra Selene

Herewith are excerpts from letters come to the desks of the editors during the past week. They are selected primarily for the information they contain either supplementary to, or corrective of, news previously published in TIME.

Pure Food TIME Woodhaven, N. Y.,

New York, N. Y.

Apr. 8, 1925.

Gentlemen:

In TIME of Apr. 6, Page 15, under "Carnivora," is said: "King Darius Mede fed up his lions on Christian men."

This king lived 500 years before Christ, how did he get the Christians?

It seems he deceived the lions by false pretensions on the bill of fare and at this time there was no pure food law. MORRIS SCHAYE.

Subscriber Schaye appears to be in all respects correct. The lines TIME quoted, Darius the Mede was a king and a wonder, His eye was proud and his voice was thunder;

He kept bad lions in a monstrous den; He fed up the lions on Christian men, are from Vachel Lindsay's Daniel, published in his collected poems.*—ED.

Cleopatra Selene

TIME Upper Montclair, N. J.

New York, N. Y. Apr. 13, 1925.

In your issue of Apr. 13, Page 18, column 2, you ask derisively: "Who was Cleopatra's daughter?"

This noble and historic character was brought up at the Roman court ma manner befitting her royal parentage and became the wife of Juba II, King of Mauritania She appears to have been a worthy mate to th remarkable man, who was the great patron of Arts and Letters and one of the most celebrated geographers of antiquity. The classics are full of allusions to her.

WM. M. CARPENTER.

This daughter, Cleopatra Selene, was one of Cleopatra's three children by Mark Antony.—ED.

Marines

TIME Norfolk, Va., New York, N. Y.

Apr. 15, 1925.

Gentlemen:

In the Sea School at Norfolk for marines trained to serve aboard ships in the Atlantic and Caribbean, there is a reading room. On its tables are The New York Times Boston Transcript, Norfolk Virginian Pilot and last, but by no means least, TIME. Reading TIME saves time and adds to the efficiency of a marine. . . . We use the daily newspapers for local gosup, and TIME for personal information Louis ESTELL FAGAN,

Captain, U. S. M. C.

Right Side Up

TIME New York, N.Y. New York, N.Y. Apr. 13, 1925.

Gentlemen:

In your issue of Mar. 23, 1925, Page 18, was an article entitled "For Reference" relating to the shape of the earth. A young man this morning asked me: "Allowing that the suns stands still but that our Earth is revolving around every 24 hours, at night or some time during that 24 hours, why are we not ourselves upside down?" Can you in simple words answer him? H.E. SMITH.

There is no such absolute direction as "down" (or "up") in the universe at large. "Down" is the direction of pull of the Earth's gravity. The rotation of the Earth has no effect on the "up" or "down" direction of any person or object on the Earth's surface.—ED.

Rubber

General Electric Co.,

TIME Schenectady, N. Y.

New York, N. Y. Apr. 14, 1925.

Gentlemen: