The Birmingham age-herald., 1904-07-24

this bright, hurrying city, but rather to carry with 1t something of the atmos- phere of the gloomy north And the Lon doner is grateful. To him the belt line surface horsecar grows very dear.
 When I first came to New York. and felt homesick, used to go down and look at a belt line surface llorsecar. That was usually sufficient.
 When I became dull and needed ex- cltement I would go out of a night and take a ride on 8 belt line surface horse car If you can ride 6 buck-jumpng horse you need have no fear of @ belt line surface horsecar. It careers through the streets of New York like a ship in an ocean swell. If you think of riding on belt line surface horsecar, 1t Is better if you can to have been a sailor or q fire-engine man. It is the cheapest form of entertainment in New York; 1t is more innocent than the theater and all most as accessible as Coney Island. anc 1t lasts longer. A belt line surface horse car takes about the same time as a Wag' ner opera (uncut, and it only costs five cents It is worth double that, or even more.
 An Opportunity to Rest.
 It is the only place in New York where you are allowed to sit down for any length of time When I first came to New York I was the only man in the city who was not in a hurry. I liked to take a walk down Broadway, and when I came to St. Paul's Chapel, to stand and muse upon the flight of time. Then one day policeman clubbed mel had failed to hear his earlier remonstrances-and tried sitting on the gravestones in tho churchyard.
 I had scarcely collected my thoughts when the sexton came and abused me for being nearly shut in all night.
 Then tried to find a seat fin City Hall Park, but the benches were all full of the American working men.
 Then I tried a free-lunch bar. pur- chased five cents worth of beer. ate a hearty lunch, and stayed two hours and seven minutes. The proprietor was very good. He made q point of coming ur and saying I might stay there all day fl I liked-that. he said, was what he was there for. But I felt that delicacy com peled me to come away.
 Then found a belt line surface horse car.
 Then found peace.
 The belt line surface horsecar travels by dark and devious ways. far from the haunts of man. It has been seen 10 emerge into publicity for an instant, only to be as quickly lost again. It moves as in dream, empty but unheedlng. the horses shambling with eyes cast dawn. the venerable driver wearing a scrnbbly chin and a shocking hat.
 The projectors displayed marvellous dis cernment in choosing for 1t those streets where no passenger is ever likely to come. By this means all stopping and starting en route Is avoided and the strain upon tho horses Is much reduced.
 The belt line surface horsecar has no terminus. It wanders around for ever and ever without hurry and without re- pose-except that 1t Is always in repose If is said to move in an orbit like comet. coming round at regular period of years. which has been mathematically calculated to nine places of decimals by celebrated astronomer
 Sometimes neither route nor destination is indicated on the car. Then not even the driver knows where it Is going. The police have made several attempts to catch these escaped belt line surface horsecars. but always without success. The fugative has invariably dived down some dark alleyway known only to It. self and so eluded pursuit. It is not known how many of these fugatives from justice are now at large.
 Tn many parts of the city sporadically distributed sections of belt line surface rails are found embedded in the common roadway. These exist in a state of com
 
 any relation to any existing system. Their origin has never been explained. If these historical remains ever had a pur- pose it has long been obscured in the mists of antiquity. They are as puzzIing to the archaeoiogist as the ruins of Stone henge, the stones of Carnac, the barrows of the ancient Britons. or the vermiform appendix.
 Cannot Be Stopped.
 No obstacle has yet been invented capa- ble of stopping a belt line surface horse car. One day they were building house while a belt line surface horsecar was coming up. and a load of bricks were spilled across the rails. The conductor climbed down and cleared the metals. then the surface horse climbed up one side of the pile of bricks and down the other, and the belt line car followed. I saw 1t done. The horse said that if all the track was as level as that 1t would put fifty years on to the end of his life.
 A beltllne surface horsecar is never al- lowed to be washed. It is said that In the eleventh century a driver who scraped a piece of mud off his dashboard was in- stantly dismissed Since then the rule has never been transgressed.
 The officials of the company swear that all their cars were freshly painted at the time of the Louisiana Purchase, but they have consistently refused to open