The Van Buren press. [volume] (Van Buren, Ark.) 1859-1914, 1897-01-30
THE CHECK SYSTEM.
An English Visitor Tells the People About
tho American Way.

tho SAhiSiiNdh way
The American constitution has been
called a system of checks. So in Ameri-
can life. When you want to travel you
give your baggage to the porter of your
hotel, and he gives you a check in re-
turn. At the station you reclaim it
with the check, and pass it in at a coun-
ter and receive another check. As you
approach your destination another func-
tionary comes along the train, takes
your check and gives you another check
in its place. lie fishes out your baggage
and conveys it to your hotel-for a con-
sideration. You have left your third
and last check at the office of the hotel
when you enter it, and thence it is de-
livered up on receipt of the baggage.
At first you bless this Arrangement
as the salvation of the traveller. After
a few weeks of it the tyranny of the
check becomes so CALLING that you be-
gin to long for the fine old English
method of dumping down your goods
in front of a porter and leaving them
TO find their way themselves. You
would even hail it as a personal tri-
umph if some of your baggage would
get lost But it never does. Some times
it arrives late, but it always arrives.
Yet it seldom arrives in the shape in
which it started, if that is any eonsola-
ton. They who have to do with bag
gage see to that. You very soon dis
cover why Americans carry their goods
in iron-clad trunks, and why it is mad
ness for anybody to do anything else.
l started out, like an idiot, with a new
leather portmanteau. They ripped the
stout brass lock off in the first week.
not for plumber, apparently, but simply
because it is the tradition of the SER
vice. They punched it and kicked it
and danced on it. In softer hours, when
literary inspiration came, they wrote
on it. My portmanteau to-day is an
epitome of the political sentiment of
the United States from New York to
San francisco. AS an historical docu-
ment it is beyond price, and l am con-
templating the gift of it to the library
of congress at Washington. AS port
manteau it has both feet in the grave.
The system of checks is not confined
to Travellers luggage. The conductor
of the train passes carelessly to and fro
asking for your ticket and giving
you check in return, or asking for
your check and returning your ticket.
If you hand your stick to a boy in O
hotel while you write your name in the
register, he dashes off to stow it away
in some secret place and returns tri-
umphant with check. In the very
hotel bar, when you buy sevenpence
ha'porth of whisky you get a check
and walk two yards across the bar to
pay at q desk.
But the apothesis of the check is at
Niagara. When you go down to tho
cave of the winds you strip off all your
clothes and leave them, as well as your
yaluabes, in a tin box with the attend
ont. Then you go down to battle with
the cataract attired only in a suit OF
pyjamas, "a suit of oilskins, and check
dashed around your neck, and rising
and falling with the beating of your
heart. No wonder the American speaks
Of death as handing in his checks. 1t
is only by death that he can rid himself
of them.-London Mail.