Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-02-16
THE TOPICAL TALKER.
More Cable Car Incivility--0dd Pages From
n Notebook of To. Days Filling.

NOTEBOOK OIL TO.Duy'B kiliing.
Is there any reason why the conductor Of a
cable car should not be as civil as any other
like official in his dealings with the public?
Two serious complaints of gross incivility on
the part Of the cable car conductors have
reached THE DISPATCH Office. In one case a
dapper young conductor, with light mus
taohe, was asked to stop the CART was on the
Citizens traction line-at Penn avenue and
Eleventh street. 1t was about IL o'clock on
Thursday night and the car was crowded with
people going from the Bijou Theater. The
conductor heard the request, but before the
people who wished to get out and reach the
Union depot could make their way through the
crowd in the aisle the conductor started the
car. The gentleman of the party again asked
the conductor to stop, and he replied: Il did
stop once-yor'rc too blamed SLOW"
On another car of the same line few min
utes later the conductor did not stop at
Eleventh street as requested, and a lady was
carried two blocks beyond, and missed her
train at the Union depot. The conductor made
an insolent remark to her also.
have the names and addresses OF all the
complainants in these cases, and the Citizens
Traction Company ought to attend to the mat
ter at once. It would be well for the aggrieved
parties to note the number of the car on which
punishment of the offenders can easily be ef-
fected.
OFTEN the questions asked by small chill
dren are the hardest of all to answer.
An East End correspondents of mine tells me
that a small daughter of his named Amy was
taken by her grandmother to see the house her
(Amy's) father lived in when he was small boy
When they came home Amy asked her father:
'Papa, when you were a little boy, who was
my papa ?"
WHY is it most people hereabouts differ from
the rest of the world in their pronunciation of
the feminine name Ada 1t is almost always
made AIDA here, but in the East and in En-
gland-not to mention the dictionaries-it is
invariably pronounced as it is spelled, Ada, the
first q being made to sound like the vowel in
lay.
THE way of the rich mans son is made easy
from the first but a school boy of this town
tells me that one of the boys who attends the
same rather fashionable school in Allegheny
has a regular tariff of his own for smoothing
out the difficulties of the ascent to knowledge.
This youngster, who will some DAY be mil
lionaire, obtains the assistance of his school
mates in all his tasks in exchange for what his
wel1-lined pocketbook can procure. In summer
time it is soda water to which he treats those
who furnish him with translations and the
like in winter candy and other things dear to
the urchin's soul.
How that small millionaire will weep when
he comes to mans estate and finds what knowl
edge is really worthI
-
THERE was a curious cloud phantom in the
heavens last night. About o'clock while the
full moon flooded city and field with its won
drous light there slowly rose in the south
western sky some long filmy fingers of white
cloud. Venus shone brightly in this quarter of
sky, though halo hung about her.
The long fingers Of white cloud, through
which the pale wintry blue of the armament
beyond could plainly be seen, rose steadily till
near the zenith. At this point they seemed to
converge toward the horizon until they formed
an exact image of gigantic hand, spread
open, with thumb and fingers in proper proper
ton.
This strange semblance stayed intact for ten
minutes or more. A few hundred years ago
such a thing would have brought to the be-
holder prophetic warning of some stirring shift
of fortune. Even at this late day the heart of
man cannot but feel touch of the ominous
when the clouds above him take such graphic
shapes,