The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1899-11-27

OF the stage. dnd tnoae OF us VINO could
not get on shouted Cut bsh.ndy' l saw
the old stage driver not lsng sgo, and
expressed to him my surprise that one
around whose head had seen halo Of
glory In my boyhood time was only man
like the rest Of ~. Between Sanderson's
stagecoach and q Chicago express train
what a difference, all the great cities of
the nation strung on an Iron thread Of
railways!
At Doncaster, England. I saw George
Stephensou's first locomotive. II in good
repair 1t could run yet, but because of its
make and size II would be the burlesque
of all railrcaders. Between that rude ma
chine, crawling down the iron track, fol-
lowed by clumsy and bouncing train.
and one Of our Rocky mountain lOcomo-
tives, with village Of palace ears, be-
coming drawing rooms by day and prince
ly dormitories by night, what bewitcbing
| progress!
See the train move out Of one of our
great depots for thousand mile journey!
All aboard Tickets clipped and baggage
checked and porters attentive to every
want. under tunnels dripping with damp
ness that never saw the light, along
! lodges where an inch of the track would
| be the difference between hundred men
Living and hundred dead, full head Of
|, steam and two men in the locomotive
charged with all the responsibility Of
whistle and Westinghouse brake. Clank!
clank! 90 the wheels. Clank! clank! echo
the rocks. Small villages only hear the
thunder and see the whirlwind as the
train shoots past, q city on the wing.
Thrilling, startling, sublime, magnificent
spectacle-a rail train In lightning pro-
cession.
When years ago the railroad men
struck for wages, our country was threat
ened with humiliation, and we realized
what the railroad wheel had done for this
c0untry-over one hundred and eighty
thousand miles Of railroad In the United
States; In one year over billion dollars
received from passengers and freight;
White mountains, Allegheny mountains,
Rocky mountains, Sierra Nevadas, bow
ing to the'iron yoke; all the rolling stock
of New York Central, Erie, Pennsylya-
mia, Michigan Central, Georgia, Great
Southern, Union Pacific and oil the other
wheels Of the tens Of thousands Of freight
cars. wrecking cars. cabooses, drawing
room cars, sleeping cars, passenger cars,
of all the accommodation, express and
special trains, started by the wheel Of the :
grotesque locomotive that saw ut Dom
caster. For what II has done for all Chris
tendon calculate In the language of the
text, 20 wheel!'
The Miracle Of the Age.
While the world has been rolling on
the eight wheels Of the rail car or the
four wheels Of the carriage or the two
wheels of the gig 1t was not until 1876,
at the Centennial exposition at Philadel-
phia, that the miracle Of the nineteenth
century rolled in-the bicycle. The world
could not believe its own eyes, and not
until quite far on in the eighties were
the continents enchanted with the whirl-
ing, flashing, dominating spectacle Of
machine that was to do so much for the
pleasure, the business, the health and the
profit of nations. The world had needed
it for 5000 years. Mans slowness Of
locomOtion was a mystery. Was it Of
more importance that the reindeer or the
eagle rapidly exchanged jungles or crags
than that man should get swiftly from
place to place? Was the business of the
bird or the roebuck more urgent than
that Of the incarnated immortal? No.
At last we have the obliteratien Of dis
tances by pneumatic tire. At last We
have wings. And what has this inven-
ton done for woman? The cynics and
constitutional GROWERS would deny her
this emancipation and say. what better
exercise eau she have than a broom or a
duster or churn or rocking a cradle or
running up and down stairs or q walk to
church with prayer book under her
arm?" And they rather rejoice to find
her disabled with broken pedal or pune
tured tire half way out to Chevy Chase
or Coney Island. But all sensible people
who know the tonic Of fresh air and the
health in deep respiration and the awak-
ening of disused muscles and the exhil-
Hration Of velocity will rejoice that wife
and mother and daughter may have this
new recreation. Indeed life to SO many
is SO hard grind that am glad at the
arrival Of any new mode of healthful
recreation. We need have no anxiety
about this invasion Of the worlds stu
pidity by the vivacious and laughing and
jubilant wheel, except that we always
want it to roll in the right direction, to-
ward place Of business, toward good
toward philanthropy, toward
toward places OF divine wor-
ship, and never toward immortality or
Sabbath Dissertation. My friend Will
Carleton, the poet, said what like when
he wrote:
We claim great utility that daily must increase;
We claim from inactivity sensibs release
A constant mental, physical and moral help we
feel,
That bids US turn enthusiasts and cry, Cod bless
the wheel
Never yet having mounted one of those
rolling wonders, stand by the wayside,
far enough off to avoid being run over,
and in amazement and congratulation
cry out, in Ezekiels phraseology of the
text, 20 WHEEL"
The Printing Press
Fourthly, l look into the literary world
and see what the wheel has accomplish
I'd. am more astounded with this than
anything that has preceded. Behold the
almost miraculous printing press! Do
you not feel the ground shake with the
of the New York, Brooklyn,
Boston. Philadelphia, Washington and
western papers? Some of us remember
when the hand ink roller was run over
he cylinder and by great haste 800
'opies of the village newspaper were is
'ued in one day and no lives lost. But
|
Wheel jostled wheel, stcreotyping, cleo
taking their places. Benja-
min Franklin's press giving way to the
lord Stanhope press, and the Washing
on press and the Victory press and the
Zoe perfecting press have been set up.
together with the newspapers comes
he publication Of innumerable books Of
history, of poetry, of romance, Of art, of
ravel, of biography, of religion, diction-
ries. encyclopedias and Bibles. Some Of
hese presses send forth the most ac-
ursed stuff, but the good predOminates.
Turn on with wider sweep and greater
elocity, o wheel-wheel of light, wheel
I civilization, wheel Of Christianity,
Wheel Of divine momentum!
On those four wheels-that of the sew
ng machine, that Of the reaper, that OF
he railroad locomotive, that of the print
lg press-the world has moved up to its
resent prosperity. call on you to thank
Tod for the triumphs Of machinery as I
cen In our home comforts and added |
ational grandeur. 1
And now I gather on an imaginary '
latform aa I literally did wbpn 7 II