The Cape Girardeau Democrat. (Cape Girardeau, Mo.) 1876-1909, 1894-08-18
Ode OCCUPATIONS.
A Chicago Iri5hman Who Acts as e Per
pStetic Alarm Clock.


ninth street, neal Cottage Grove ave-
nue..
"Shure an l am. Orrah, bat they're
a shlapy lot in the marnin'. But that's
PLAT fetches EN-" and the small,
stopped man with the well-developed
Hibernian accent shook a stocky stick
which he carried in his left hand, and
dashed along the street at a dog trot
without waiting for further converse
ton with the officer who had accosted
him.
A huge ring of keys jingled at each
step and kept merry time to the mans
hurried gait. Before Patsy had gone
half a block he darted up the stairs of
a boarding house, applied a key, and
was soon lost to sight But he was
out again in a twinkling, and cut dag
onally across the street to a cottage,
and again his bunch of keys secured
him entree. Another short interval
and he slipped out of the cottage and
once more resumed his restless way.
Many people in this locality know
the unique vocation of the little man,
but many more do not; and a passing
glimpse of him has been a puzzle to
numberless u~nfortunates who are CON-
PEELED to rise in the early morning be-
fore the first street cars start.
For twelve years this wrinkled, jolly
little Irishman has followed a profess
sion, the existence of which is known
ouly to the few men who have occasion
to need his s,rvices and those who
come in personal contact with him.
His general headquarters are at the
street car barns, where he hunks Four
o'clock of every morning, rain or shine,
finds him out upon the street armed
with his big ring of keys, his trusty
stick, and, in the eason of long nights,
with a dark lantern.
If his task should once go undone
hundreds of early passengers on the
grip cars would feel the effect of such
a failure, for Patsy is the alarm clock
for cores of conductors who take the
first ears out Of the barns. However,
there seems tc be small chance for such
a contingency, for Patsy is far more re-
liable than any alarm clock yet in
vented. and it is safe to say that a gen.
eral failure on his part would shake
the faith Of the conductors in the relia-
bility of the Sun, moo and stars
Chicago is prominently the city OF
grip cars, aud another species of night
workers connected with the great grip
lines may also be said to be peculiarly
q Chicago type. He is the cable repair
man and may be seen as soon as the
cables stop running-at about mid
night or shortly after. There is scarce
ly a corner around which the cable
makes a turn where these men, in
groups of four or five, may not be see
working with their tripod of hosting
pulleys and faring torches from mid
night until broad daylight.
A group of these workmen squatting
in the middle of the street, working
jackscrews and drills by the light of a
half dozen torches, presents a striking
similarity to an Indian encampment
and but little imagination is required
to c~onjure the frame of the tripod into
the likeness of the bare poles of a wig.
war.
The active operation of the Chicago
university ~revives in this city still an
other class of those who gain their live
lihOod by honest work while the great
mass OF people are enjoying their sweet
est hours of slumber. This night
worker skirts dangerously near both
twilight and dawn, and snatches his
scanty hours of sleep between these
two feeting and fantastic periods. He
is armed at evening with 4 torch-tipped
rod. but his guiding light is ambition
and his motto Excelsior" In other
words he is the student lamplighter,
and the dream of future achievement
always sheds a halo over his darkest
path, as he zigzags from one lamp to
another, lighting OF eXtinguishing them
as the case may be.
The number of students who worked
their way through the old Chicago
university by this meal, is legion, and
their honorable race IS being revived
from among the attendants upon the
new and greater institution.
Among the students who followed
this profession during the closing days
of the old university was a young man
who now is a member of a prosperous
law firm in the Chicago Opera House
block. Should some of the clients of
this thrifty and ambitious young law
yer chance to arise early enough and
make n careful scrutiny of the lamp
lighter in a certain district they would
probably be greatly surprised, and if
they held fastidious ideas concerning
the difference between the dignity and
responsibility of manual and profess
sional labor they would doubtless be
shocked, for they would recognize in
the lamplighter none other than the
prosperous young lawyer. He likes the
exercise, has no scruples against adding
thirty dollars a month to his legal in
come. and has. consequently, not yet
reached the place where he chooses to
relinquish the old lamp-lighting beat
which furnished him the ''sinews of
war for his university course. What
city beside Chicago can boast of a man
who is at onc both lamplighter and
lawyer, and who IS prosperous in both
vocations?
Each lamplighter has n route of from
one hundred to one hundred and five
lamps and receives from the gas COM
many emDloyinp him one cent a nioht