The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, August 1, 1897, Page 18

THE SAN FRANCISCO CALL, SU AY, AUGUST 1, 1899. T\A)O Journalistic Savants Abroad on a Jour Gritical Observation and Some of the Anim- adversions (athered En Route Gon- ‘cerning the People They Saw. | ‘Fhe Summer Resort Editor stopped in | {he middle of his journey -up Market reet o report the runaway of an ice- wagon, and arrested a thought which had at that ‘moment attacked him from the re ng a coupe, he zot inside of it and was driven back to the offi | “Come for a ride.” he to !he‘ Special Writer on Outdoor Athletics, | whom he found diligently at work in the reporters’ room, writing an account of an tea at the Oid Ladies’ Home. an i iv'll do you good along.'’ The Spec rsaid ne hadn’t a really good ide= since the day the b ness manager mistook him forthe pri evil and offered to pay him the latter’s ead-of his own, 1o the conside sadvantage of the pr % This “good -idea” - of ‘the Reso: was just what he was looking for. Y ad f and come with me,’" | gaid the Re Editor, as they picked their way over the bowlders tack toward Market. street. It has occurred to-me | that the Re: Ed t profitab, occupy & -porfion of his time in some- resort, and ‘leave s few of his o afternoon “I've go de morrow I'm off to Santa Cruz. Youcome along with me and get some practical of what - outdoor athletics They ve. g baseball team down -tt ar me old-fashioned editors who are ersuaded of th and. bamboo cane u e heat of journalistic riv and—-" ver of the coupe at this i began the ascent of the r of the spe: he rumble o in‘th — % A EXCUSE ME.BUT 15 THAT SEAT climb up the steep ridge. When they| had reached the-top and down the | other side the driver steerad his way care- fully into a crack between two rows of obblestones, and - the Special Writer found breath to reply that he would ace cept the invitation. * o * & “What makes me want to go to Klon- freeze to death,” declaréd the mor y as heand 1d mole ana critically picked | out the two best seats in the still unfiiled | car, *4s the appaliing idiocy you eee on | the faces about you when you go traveling | anywhere in a civilized country. | “Just watch the people enter this car. Mark their actions as well as their ex- | pressions. Every mother’s son ana daugh- ter of them is ina tumult until he orske | \ has fought a clear way to a seat and got | planted saquarely into it as though it were | the one ultimate thing in life that he or | she had been battling for since infancy. Gaze for a moment at that, will you?” demanded the Resort Editor with savage triumph, as the personified confirmation of his bitter diatribe entered in the person of a fat, middle-aged party with a valise in one hand and a telescope basket in the other and planked himself down with an unctuous thud and a fatuous grunt at the end of & perspiring scramble up the aisle with not a soul ahead of him to make the i scramble necessary. “They will be in a tearing hurry all the time,"” continued the Resort Editor. *“No- | sody ever thinks of entering a car com posedly. It is probably the sublime no- tion of that brilifant individual who leads the rush toward us st the present mo- meat that by runningon the train he may hasten the end of his journey. Or it may be that he fears the train will start up | suddenly and throw him back ward out of | it if he isn’t safely anchored in a seat.”” The Special Writer said that he had no- | ticed the same things himself, but hadn’t | made a particular study of them. What struck him the most forcibly was the curi. ous fact that no matter how hurriediy the | front end of a.procession goton a train | the people bringing up the rear always | had to move at/a snail’s pace, and couid | never get the fellows just ahead of them | to quicken their pace. | “There’s always a chap with his back | right up against your face who takes | about four steps to the -minute and keeps vou waiting in a most embarrassing way | right in front of some one else. How the | people in front can run a footracs and yet | compe! those at the tail of the line to march an inch at a time is one of the mar- | reverie, whic TAKEN 2 | no other means. vels of railroad travel that I shall never be able to grasp.” The Resort Editor gave a snort of sym- pathetic diszust and glared down the car until his glasses slipped off his nose and ing inst something in his breast pocket which gave forth a hol- low, metallic Thereupon an absent-minded air settied upon the brow of the Resort Editor, his'hand drifted in- | voluntarily to the aforesaid pocket, and the S 1 Writer, suddenly losing ull round was heard to 8 some, J . est in his st murmur, *‘I'll * COE . ‘temporized -the 1d of & ten-minute had been punctuated here and there by sundry gentle smacks of the lips and surreptitious indrawings of the same in pleasant experience and o chronous flavor abiding the mere habit of may not be set down as an absolute badze of idiocy. I believe that’s the word you ? For the matter of that, peopie are always in a burry in pubiic. Ever watch a crowd come off a ferry-boat? The Resort Editor's temporarily mel- low mood shed instantiy. “I bave,’ d, fixing the Special ; with _an’ uncompromising eye; once I stood in front of such a The K h, a certain syn- rerewith, “after being ina hurry he repl ily once. ied: twenty d for . my I ¥ was that I had been mistaken for i murderer with a price on and more rational got in the who didn’t rds, and crowds ‘on y- for the same subtime reas: “Nothing else under heaven runsfor the same cause that the Market-street pedes- trian does. An animal wi.ll run in play or in fear, or from teing driven—or it will run after its prey when it caxn catch it by As a ruls it prefers to walk deiiberately and composealy. A horse wiil walk a mile to a creek in order to get a drink, when it might get it soone: oy running. A cow will walk slowly into its stall after bay. A dog will walk—'" ““Buta pig won't,” interposed the Special 1gering reiterations of a certain | sort Editor pansed im- | I was taken off | mal. You can’t say that man is alone in his- peculiarity. You’re trying to run | man down too much, anyhow.” 4 | Tnhe Special Writer nodded valiantly. | “Now, you take a pig,’” said he, *‘and you can’t make him ‘walk if there’sa grain of corn or a drop of swill put into his | trough—and he can smell either of them | a mile. Besides, when you get one of those wild human pedestrians caged in a house, away from the rivalry of public | racing, he doesn’t always overturn chairs | #nd footstools in his rush to the dining- room when the dinner-bell rings. He has | been known frequently to walk.” } “Y-e-s,”” admitted the Resort Editor. | “But what then? A‘ter dinner he will sit around doing; nothing for ahalf bour, then all at once jump out of his abstrac- | tion, grab his hat and rush off downtown I Writer, impatiently, “and a pig’s an ani- | | and along Market street again at a pace suggesting imminent disaster at the loss of a second. | minutes earlier from home and proceed with the dignity of a buman being?"” | Tke train stopped at Alvarado and both | the jonrnaiistic savants peered darkly out | of the window. - CA younz man. was seen coming down | sroin the hotel, his coat tails flying above | a nimble -pair of lheels, his hat held crushed to his head with one hand and hissatchel jerking this way and that in the other. He cleared the car steps with a bound, | landed on the platform with a bang and | rushed satchiel-first up the aisle and into | one of the numerous vacant seats. - Then he slowly set his satchel beside . him, re- arranged his coliar, straigntened -his hat, looked inquiringly around the car and fell finally to gazing abstractedly out of | the window. The Resort Editor held his watch in his | band and seemed lost in grim contempla- i tion of it. The Special Writer glanced expressively | at the car ceiling, threw a pitying: glance at the young man and relapsed into a meditation ‘on.the beauunful versatility of | the American opportunity to swear. sort “He has been sitt: he £ there a minute and a balf,” to_ - the Special Writer. Writer proceeded to im- n opportunity with a | versatility which included: the young man’s ancestry clear back to the days of | Balaam. prove his « * B Why couldn’t he start ten | of during the past hour and a half bad stead- ily augmented his ill humor and visibly accentuated the sneer of cynical disap- proval that had settled eround his lipsat the beginning cf his survey. *“D've always get in such a beastly temper when you go traveling?” inquired the Special Writer, after a prolonged scrutiny of the other’s visage, during a lull in the conversation. “‘Temper!”’ growled the Resort Editor. “It’s enough to drive a man to drink to | se¢ how people act when they get out where there are no drawing-room rules of etiquette to bind them. Take any crowd in public and watch strangers when they | bappen to brush together. Selfish? Whew! | Everybody for him:elf and everybody re- sentful if heis in the least aiscommoded. “A man may meet a friend on a train and he will stretch the buttonholes out of | bis coat to be agreeable. He will insiston the friend having the best of the seat and will pile his valise and hatbox upin his own lap and swear that he prefers to sit that way, and couldn’t be more comforta- | ble in any other. But if a stranger comes | | in when there’s only half a seat empty in | the car, and in- sitting down in that half seat stubs his toe against the valise of the fellow who occupies the other half there’s open enmity established between the two forthwith—on the one side be- cause the valise was kicked and on the other. side. because it was there to be | Kicked. “‘About every stranger on the road oron’ the sireet there is an air of austere inde- pendence which forbids familiarity and regards interference—accidental or other- wise — as an affront. No kind of acci- dent, such as the jostling of one man against another or -the descent of one woman's parasol on another woman’s hat, | is ever looked upon as other than the re- | sult of baid stupidity or deliberate and audacious premeditaticn. Some one is blamed for everything that happens. The | person who hbas his elbow brusied off tbhe arm of bis seat by a party hurry- ing .up ‘the aisle glares in amazement at the otker fellow's effrontery, and pro- | ceeds to vo over several choice remarks | that he wonld address to him if he would only do it over again. | - “The chap who comes in and finds [ every seat full wonders why on earih the people before him took it into their heads | to board that particular train on that par- ticular day. Must everybody travel to | the same town at the same moment just because he happens 10 be going there ] fortable. D10 Y OuU ENER GET INFRONT OF A CROWD AT THE FERRY" | * * L - {then? Hesays to himseif that it is‘just | AtSan Jose tho train was comfortably | his luck’—that if he hadn’t wanted a seat | full. . The Resort Editor couldn’t say 8s|there would have been plenty of them | much for bimsell, because he wasn’t com- | yacant. - Fate always did serve him that His stuay of the faces in the car | way, etc. ~Ne7 s YUTHE MORE TIME HE HAS Y THE MORE HE HURRIES \ “The atmosphere 1n a car is antagonism from one end to the other—an armed and watchful pretense of apathy with a chip on its shoulder ready to fall off and pre- cipitate a row at the touch of a passing coat sleeve. Observe that interesting genius, will you?"” The Resort Editor wiped his bfow with his bandkerchief and pointed to a large individoal who had just boarded the car at Los Gatos, and was contriving to oc- cupy two seats by placing himself in one and his feet in the other. All the other seats were taken, and still the passengers came in. There was a picnic party on its way to the mountains. The large indi- vidual sat serenely in his double section, obviously and maddeningly conscious of his largeness. He was accosted by a lean man in a linen duster, “Will you have the goodness to let me sit dewn?” he inquired, with a mild | sarcasm that caused the Resort Editor to give way to Mephistophelian mirth. The large individual was absorbed in gazing through the window at the 1ncom- ing crowd. Another large individual pushed his way to his side and effaced the lean man in the linen duster. “Are vou going to occupy this whole | section?"" he demanded. The other raised his eyes coolly to the | questioner’s face and replied shortly: 1 1 have these seats for three ladies.” The second large individual grunted. “Umph I" he said, as he moved doubt- fully up the aisle. “Wonder what three ladies are doing with him ?” Whereat the Special Writer collapsed, " avirim du Fom the Z castings for the first steamboat. [= 2 The accompanying pictures show two styies of tandem bicycles—tie first and the last. They are remarkable in more ways than one, principally, however, in the wonderfnl similarity between them. The first tandem made is, in general appearance, very much like the wheel of to-day, and the wheei of to-day, in spite | of over half a century of improving, is very much like the first wheel made. This similarity of first conceptions with the finished article of many years later is not confined to bicycles. Itexists in the 1 g | 1) L and was with difficuity restored to order by the sternly reproving gaze of his con- frere, who himself had little more to say during the remainderof theit run tothe City of the Golden Cross. He seemed con- tent to let the people about him continue the tale where he had left off. ————— . The smallest republic in the world is Franceville, one of the islands in the New Hebrides. The inhabitants consist of 40 Europeans and 500 black workmen em- ployed by a French company. 2 wure RBross Grotings, lfi%/a'vag]//l p{?,m;r/u o/ cvery aéncn/l/on.. ‘%om/au//y wwolj@fl:%flnqmflé - nrilerY and m‘mm(m/ 2 . COLUMBIAN FOUNDRY w,’:%'o/m,j yymm/%/fi, effqn anid, Stearm Engenes)’ efmn_‘ %rfi, Frews ) 0// ‘on Hand, all kinds /a_’g{ the lest };aaé@\ ROBERT M'QUEEN, ! o » e & > L 7z all @na@, and '-jéap’ < NoAz Dugne-steeet. New-Yirh, RELICS OF ROBERT FULTON. The above reproduction is-of a bill-head employed in the foundry business of the man who made ths Mr. Robert McQueen was his name. residing in San Francisco, has kindly permitted THE CALL to make use of the interesting and venérable material. The lady’s name is Mrs. B. H. Scott, and she is a direct descendant—in fact, the great-grand- daughter, as stated—of Robert Fulton’s manufacturer in the construction of the famous steamboat, which startled the natives when it broke the primitive spell on the Hudson. and instructive study anent the exterior manufacturing conditions of the times, as well as of the style of wording employed in the advertising then in vogue. * Below will be found the reproduction in fac-simile of a letter written by Fulton to McQueeén: concerning a vital piiast of his operations as a boat-builder, and throwing light on a point not generally referred to in ordinary history. il g A great-granddaughter ¢f his, now The bill-head affords a valuable Sl ExZ =] Ty el AS c . "'l. a )/M > greater proportion of machinery. But the resemblance in ganeral appear- ance is all the similarity there is in ths two bicycles. Oh, what a difference the riders of a modern pneumatic-tired wheel would instantly find the moment they jumped on to the old-fashionel ‘‘bone- vreaker” of halfa century ago. Just fancy it for a moment. Each and every rock in the road would feel as if it were the size of a house, and would jolt up your spine as if you had been kicked by a cow. Then how one would have to work on 1 i) EVOLUTION OF THE TANDEM BICYCLE the old “bonebreaker!” No ball bearings, no chain and gear, no improved saddles, no fancy steering-gear; in fact, nothing that the riasr nowadays would counsider absolutely necessary to comfort. ‘The principal difference to be observed ‘in the two pictures is the position of the riders. In the oid days the lady used to ride behind, while now she rides in front. It might also be mentioned that at the present time she has a more comfortable seat and 2 s0 much more becoming cose tume.