The age-herald., 1899-01-12
IN HOTEL LOBBIES
 AND ELSEWHERE

| street, and 1 have no doubt that such an extension will be made within reasonable time" said a railroad man in the lobby. "The station now extends from the west | side of Twentieth street to the west side of Nineteenth. If the carshed were en- l larged to Eighteenth street, and Nineteenth l street made to pass under the station, mak- l ing great thoroughfare between the north and south sides of the city absolutely free from the annoyance of trains. it would be vast improvement; and believe the Louis vile & Nashville has the work in contem- plation The level crossing at Twentieth street is always a source of annoyance, dan- ger, and delay; and if vehieular traffic could be diverted to a big subway under the union station at Nineteenth street. it would be of the greatest benefit to the tire population. Of course, there is the splendid Twenty-frst street bridge. which cost the city S65,O0O and the Twenty-second street bridge, over either of which vehi- ces may pass in safety; but somehow neither bridge has proved to be very popu- lar. They are nothing like so satisfactory as a subway at Nineteenth street" Ut shows how solid and conservative
 
 no changes have been made in the manage ment of the banks of the city during the past four or five years" said banker yes- terday. This fact has been impressed anew upon me by the account of yesterdays bank meetings as told by the Age-Herad. It was noted that only two changes in bank directories had been made. This demon- strates that Birmingham has settled down to the business ways and customs of a great city. It is conservative and safe, so far as concerns the banks; and this ap- plies to the general business of Birming- ham. It is upon a safe and sound basis. and is prosperous"
 The reversal of the circuit court verdict | in the famous Gafford murder case by the state supreme court at Montgomery yester- day is a great legal victory for James M i Weatherly, the Birmingham lawyer. Mr. | Weatherly was not counsel in the case orig. inally; the leading counsel for the defense being Terry Richardson, of Troy a young | lawyer and son of the present judge of the second circuit, J. C. Richardson of Greenville, under whom Francis Barrow Lloyd, the gifted journalist, who was killed by John Gafford, read law for time, and iF is said that his brief in the case was one of the ablest, clearest and most logical submitted to that court in a criminal case for many years past.
 John Gafford will now have new trial, but as to when it will take place is matter of the merest conjecture.
 "The frightful amount of expectora ton m the streets of Birmingham is disgusting beyond expression" declared an indignant citizen yesterday afternoon. '"Take, for ex- ample, the south side of First avenue, be- tween Nineteenth and Twentieth streets, and the sidewalk is a foul cesspool through which ladies have to make their way as best they can All that part in front of the | Morris Hotel reeks with the filthy expector- ation of tobacco eaters and others who dis regard the common decencies. The un- cleanliness of the whole thing is loathsome ard the police should be empowered, if they have not already the authority, to ar- rest every person who expectorates on the sidewalks, in the street cars or other places where ladies are obliged to go. It is nui- sance that should be suppressed at all haz- ards"
 Your timely reference to a common null sance reminds me of story l heard in a hotel in Brussels several years ago." said a lobby lounger to the indignant citizen At the table dhote dinner one night I joined the general company of hotel guests, not that l approved the table d'hote, but because felt lonesome, being there on my first visit to the beautiful capital of Bel slum-petite Paris, as the Belsians fondly call it. At the dinner table was the only voluble Englishman of the better classes whom I ever knew outside the walls of club and he, poor fellow, was dying of consumption. Opposite to him sat two Americans, one of them that rare creature seen abroad, an American gentleman. His name, 1 learned, was Winthrop, and his home was in Boston. The consumptive Erglshman talked at the American for the whole company at table. The talk was very Imaginable in many respects, for the Eng lishman was witty, rather unusual fact about Englishmen whom one meets on the continent. He got everyone to laughing al his side remarks, and then told a story al the expense of the eternal, omnipresent Yankee. It bore generally upon the gen. eral European abhorrence of expectorating
 in public places and incidentally of the Dutch love of cleanliness.
 "Many years ago., began the English man, quietly, "a Yankee tourist arrived in The Hague for the purpose of seeing the sights of that wonderfully attractive capi- tai of Holland. He hired a courier, or, as you Americans would say, a guide, and started on the rounds. After walking for two or three hours, he suddenly made a violent noise with his tobacco-eating mouth, and then and there publicly and fagrantly spat in the street. Possibly a hundred persons, or more, saw him do the diabolical deed, and amongst them there was great uproar account of the out rage. There was talk of throwin gthe Yankee into the canal, and his courier, dis gusted and alarmed for his own safety, fled and was not seen again. The Yankee escaped with his life, and hurriedly quilted Holland.