Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-11-19

creasing part of the population which
rides to and fro daily in the street.
cars By
The ordinary street-car once
a chcerless stupid cage in which
unwilling i-natured public carted from place
to place, Now it is fast becoming a veritable cir
culating library of poetry and art on wheels. The
populace enters there in with the happy assurance
that while there is small likelihood of its finding
unoccupied seat it is sure of meeting with many
quaint and curious quatrain of poetic lore calculated
to make those who must cling to straps forget all
their woes and worries in contemplating the plea
SAINT food for thought temptingly displayed on
every hand
We've heard about those signs plain that he who
may read -
But when it comes to streetcar why there do not
need
To run bit but idly sit all active stunning,
As by the mile ride the while the does all the
running.
With what curious interest the street-car patron
has watched the subtle but all-conquering advance
of poetry into the cold commercial world that
was once deemed to be the undisputed realm OF
plain prose.
Time was when poetry was este erned to be too
fragile, too tmid, too polite, to appear in mixed
assemblages. In those dear old delicate days it
was honestly supposed that full breath of real
business atmosphere would prove almost fatal
to a tender triolct retiring rondO. But the
times change, and changed with them.
Nowadays it is no unusual sight to see a sweet,
sentimental sonnet and brisk business-lke sand
witch going hand in hand as it WERE about the busy
thoroughfares of our busting cities.
To illustrate the manner in which poetry is
coming prose- let take, for example, a certain
well-known brand of hair renewer which in the oden
DAYS when its first getting into placard
type saw its virtues nodestly limited at in the
simplest of unri1ned and unvarnished advertising
efforts:
Try Blinker's Hair Remover for the Hair.
1t scarcely seems possible that there was time,
and not long ago, when such a mild, homely group
of words was thought to be advertising. Not SO
to-day. In these bustlng times everything in
general and advertising in particular must be spiced
and sugar-coated if designed to have the public
bite at it. And SO the wide-awahe Trainer of up
to-date advertising takes that same old theme,
once so mildly treated, and brings it right home
to us through the medium of poetry:
If you'd have locks-long lustrous rich
Use Blnkcrs Hair Remover which
VIII grow upon the hadest pate
Hair by the bushcl while you wait.
Our eyes have become SO accustomed to seeing
a number of lines of reading matter beginning with
capital letters on the one hand and terminating
with words of similar sound the other that
would not pause to observe the simple request,
Use Blums Stove Polish which modest
bination of words used to be deemed sufficiently
forceful and convincing to attract public notice.
To-day the subject is set forth differently:
Blum's Polish makes the bright
The cook declares it blinds her sight
And 50 with every package we
Present pair of goggles free.
So pronounced has become this desire to present
what We're formerly considered purely commercial
themes, in SOFT sweet, rhythmic, rafting poetry,
that in some of our more enlightened cities the
cars are now recognized as being the peoples true
literary rendezvous. They are the Centers-the
five centers to speak-of the present day poetic
upft. The whole commercial world, it is at
CHI,