The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-09-19


tie way. At Wiesbadens for example,
| which is one Of the most popular and
| argely frequeIted watering places in Eu-
rope, there aue two railway stations, both
belonging TO fhe government, side by side.
tThe tracks d the roads which enter them
I run parallel for a mile or more and are
| connected " switches for shifting freight
| cars, but Passengers VINO arrive by one
| road haveto pass out of one depot into the
| street an enter the other one, a distance
| of 500 y3ds or so, even when they are
| travehuh on through tickets. 1 made in
quiry + TO the reason for this, and was
| inforutd that both stations were main
| tainef for the purpose of giving employ
| menFo twice as many people as would be
| reqVped II the railways were united in
| onegwhich is OF course very commend
abD motive from one point of view.
were is a novel little convenience in
met of the German railway stations VIII CHI
pfght be adopted by the railways of the
United States. Passengers for suburban
Citations, instead of going to the regular
ticket office and standing in line for sew
eral minutes, sometimes so long that they
miss their train, can go to an automatic
box and by dropping a nickel in the slot
or coin equivalent to the amount of the
fare can supply themselves with ticket
in an instant. There are rows of these
boxes erected against the wall in conve-
nient locations. The name of the town is
painted in large letters and underneath the
price of the ticket. If it happens to be a
mark, you slip the coin into the slot and
press the button and a cardboard ticket
falls into the receiver, which the passen-
ger picks up, passing on without the
slightest delay. The whole transaction
does not occupy half a minute, and the
automatic machine never makes mistake
in the ticket or the change.
There is similar arrangement for Sc
curing MA 90
to see a friend off you must leave him at
the safe or pay few cents for the privi-
lege of accompanying him to the train.
You get a platform ticket from one of
these nickel-in-the-slot machines. The
government is said to derive a revenue of
several million marks annually from this
source alone.
If you can buy your railway ticket or
your accommodations in a sleeping car in
advance of train time you are required 10
pay small fee in excess of the regular
price. The same Is true of opera and
theater tickets. 1 have never been able
to ascertain the reason or the origin of
this singular custom. If you go to the
box office of a theater and buy a ticket
for to-nights performance it Will cost you,
say, 50 cents. If you buy for tomorrow
night or the night after or some night next
week, 1t will cost you 621s cents. One
would think that the rule should be re-
Versed
The travelling public also pays the COM
missions of uptown ticket agents, which
is all right, because they exist for the con-
venience of those who do not wish to take
the trouble of going to the railway sta
tons. The agents at the hotels and on
the principal streets, who are licensed TO
sell railway tickets, are authorized to
charge a fee os 10 per cent. on the printed
price of tickets if up to a certain amount,
and per cent. on long distance tickets,
and there is a government tax upon every
such transaction, which must also be paid
by the passenger. If you engage accom-
modations in a sleeping car in advance
you have to pay more than if you waited
until time for the train to start If you
buy your sleeping car ticket uptown you
pay a commission of 10 per cent. to the
agent and a government tax of 80 pfennigs,
which is equivalent to 1912 cents. The
sleeping cars are close, narrow and I'M
comfortable, the ventilation is imperfect,
the compartments are little closets the
beds are narrow and hard, and the roads
are so rough that 1t would be difficult to
sleep if the beds were comfortable. 1t is
necessary to strap down passengers IN
upper berths to prevent them from being
thrown out by the Joltlng ana rocklhS Oh
the car.
1 have never been able to use type
writer on European railway train. When
a man is under enga cement to furnish
newspaper letter every day, week after
week and month after month, and is sent
around the world to secure material, he
must utilize his time to the best possible
advantage, and while 1 am travelling in
the United States do most of my writing
on railway trains In an ordinary Pull
man sleeper or parlor car with an ad-
Unstable table, on most of the railways OF
the United States it is almost as easy to
manipulate a typewriter as in an office
library 7 have thus been able to
keep up my daily letter and travel from
one end of the country to the other. In
fact, after you get used to it there is
sort of fascination about writing on
railway train; but over here it is impos-
sible, the roads are so rough and the
springs in the cars are so poor
To enter a new country where for
eign language is spoken and the public
men are strangers, it is often difficult to
obtain interesting material and be accu-
rate in your facts, but in Germany
have been treated with the greatest cour-
tesy and consideration.
Sleeping car accommodations upon ordi-
nary trains cost about the same as in the
United Staes-that is, 81 a night-al-
though, as 1 have said, if you buy your
ticket in advance you have to pay 20 cents
more as commission to the ticket agent
and 121A cents government tax, which
which makes a total of $2.321a. If you
take one of the ode luxe" trains, as they
| call them, which are more rapid and com
| Portable, the expense is much greater. The
rate between Berlin and Paris, for exam
pie, for a sleeping car is Is marks, which
| is S375 and the time is twenty hours on
I ordinary express trains. On one of the
| trains "de luxe" you must pay first-class
| fare, which is about one-third more than
the second-c,ass fare, and IS marks or
nearly SO, extra, which Is twice as much
| as the Pullman Company would charge in
the United States for accommodations that
are infinitely more comfortable. Those
who complain of the ''extortion" of the
Pullman Company and the expense of trav
ell in the United States should spend few
months on European railways. Such an
| experience will teach them that we get
more for our money out of the railways of
the United States than is furnished by
any other railway system in the world.
| The nearest approach to similar accommo-
dations in Europe costs more than twice
the rates charged in the United States.
but il is impossible to secure for any sum
of money the comforts and conveniences
that are furnished by every railway run
ming out of Chicago.