Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1897-12-11

you say the number of the room is? Is
there old gentleman with a white beard
and swollen eye connected with"
Room 0G91, aroun' t tn right" says the
elevator man, moving to close the elevator
door and clutching the cable. and his look
of determination, together with some sub
dued Roman populace muttering in the
rear ranks of the elevators passengers
finally scares her out of the elevator door
way.
Then, there is the man who stands about
twelve feet away from the open wrought
iron door of the elevator, in order that the
elevator conductor may not see him as he
passes up or down, and who, when the ele-
Vator has gotten q comfortable distance
past his floor. bawls out hoarsely, Coin
up or Coin down. as the case may be-
This startleS the elevator man so that he
pulls up the machine with suddenness
that almost lOOsens the teeth of the pas
sengers and then he returns for the bawler.
Sometimes he does. that is. The passen-
gers all approve him highly when he does
not.
The player-for-effect has lately been per-
fecting some new moves in the street cars
too. One of them was seen going through
his little act on northbound 14th street
car the other evening. He was a young
man OF about the same apparent degree of
intellectually Sir Walter Besant's city
man., who was. is, and always will be a
Jelly fish. He had seat. The car rapidly
filled up at New York avenue with pretty
young women who had been attending a
sociable at G. street church. All of the
men who were seated. including some
elderly men. quite unostentatiOusIyg gave
their seats up to the young women, who
thanked them in the fashion young women
have at length. after many. many years of
consideration. deciGed is right and proper
There were not enough seats for all of
them, but there would have been at least
one more seat had the aforementioned
payer-for-effect given up his. He did not
He looked straight ahead of him. taking no
notice Whatever of the young women
hanging to straps, and he seemed to be
saying to himself. We'll. If they want to
vote and all that. let 'em hang on to straps
IN street cars. same as / often have to do -
But he wasn't saying anything of the sort
to himself. He was simply waiting for his
chance.
Honors Gray Hairs.
The chance came when poor-looking old
woman boarded the car laboriously at X
street. She did not appear to be feeble,
but just poor-looking. She no sooner APP
peared at the door of the car than the
young man with the seat was on his feet,
his hat in one hand, and his other hand
out to help the old lady to his seat. By
the time he had installed her in the seat
he had made her at least ten Mr. Turvey-
drop salaams. Then he looked around the
car for glances of applause. His look
around seemed to direct the query, Now
amt l noble? Amt l the real thing? Here
you've all seen me stick to my seat in
spite of the mellowing glances of all these
stout, healthy-lOoking girls, who are (as
you no doubt all saw / consideredD quite
as we'll able to stand up l am: but when
hoary age steps in. you see, why of course
don't you all think I'm just about right ?"
The player-for-effect never has any sort of
notion as to the painful pellucidness of his
gallery-enthusers.
The athletic, compound young man who
never gives up his seat under any circum-
stances to any woman, not because he is
engaged in maintaining a principle, but
simply because he doesn't have to and
doesn't want to. is an unamiable study in
swinishness. He was in closed 9th street
car a few days ago. The car was packed
from end to end, and he was the only man
sitting. The other men in the car had
offered their seats to entering women as
occasion required. But this particular
young man, who looked a pretty likely
sat through it all, without even the grace
to appear cheap looking. A poorly-clad
woman carrying an exceedingly boisterous
boy baby got on the car at II street and
moved up to a strap directly in front of the
solitary man sitter. She had about all
she could do to hang on to the strap with
one hand and to hold the wriggling boy
infant in the other arm. The boy infant
became interested in the man sitter from
the go off. He began by kicking the man
sitters hat off with his little foot. The
man sitter didn't like this very much but
he replaced his hat and looked out of the
window. Then the boy infant slipped down
a bit from his mothers arm for the pur-
pose. and kicked the man sitter expert
mentally, but good and hard, in the left
ear. He followed this up swiftly with
another hat kick with the other foot, and
before he lost the advantage thus gained
he leaned over and grabbed the man sit