The Green Forest tribune., 1913-04-04

&H .E pie. some in motor cars and oth-
 CTS on foot and wearing crepe. formed in the Place St Sulpice and marched in solemn procession behind bus that was making its last jour ney as a public conveyance in the city streets. They hung magnificent wreaths about the old-timer, and twice the legal allowance of thirty-four pas sengers crowded aboard for the last trip. An automobile, draped in black, followed close behind spilling silver paper tears as it went, and that night every music hall revue included a song in it's program that was sup posed to be sung by the last conduc- tor. the last driver. CT one of the last two horses.
 It will not be long before New York may have an opportunity to perform similar rites in honor of the horse car, for that time-honored vehicle which has stubbornly refused to die these many years is destined soon to disap- pear from our streets Will New York deign to pay it's respects to that
 
 Parisians with their late-lamented horse bus? It is possible. but un- likely.
 Ashamed of Them.
 New York is just bit ashamed of the longevity of it's horse car That the second largest city in the world still travels in vehicle that would be hooted at in many a less preten- tious western town, has been pointed out so presistently that 1t has begun to hurt. It Is doubtful if New York will mourn at any rate in public the passing of the horse car. There are too many sstrangers in town who have come on from the west to gape at the subway and remain grinning on the sidewalk as some jingling relic of the fifties goes clambering along West street
 A few there may be, however, who really might feel pang of regret at the sight of the last horse car jour neying through Manhattans streets To them, it would mean the passing of an institution that did all that could be expected of 1t, and did it well, too in the days when New York was not so dreadfully grown up. So long as the city did not demand the impossi- ble the horse car carried people to business in the morning, and home in the evening; and it took them to the theaters at night in manner that met all the requirements of the day and age. But in these as-you-enter days it doesn't even pretend to be able to fulfil its share of the contract. tract
 You will have to excuse me" it seems to say, as 1t journeys through the thick of the waterfront traffic these days "T used to be able to do your transportation work, but you've grown altogether too fast for me and 1 can no longer manage you. So take your subway express or taxi or your Fifth avenue motor bus, and leave me alone I'll not be here to disgrace you much longer"
 The horse car that says this to you is almost the identical horse car that supplied rapid transit on nearly all the main thoroughfares fifty or sixty years ago. It's style hasn't changed much. If you board one today, you -sse- very likely to find that you are even being driven by an ancient who has been a horse-car driver most oi his life There's old George Lent who, at the venerable age of sixty-nine, is still commander-in-ehief of his car on the Belt Line that runs along the wa terfront from the Battery to Fifty fourth street In the forty-three yearS that Lent has been a driver. he has had only the one route, and it is said he can tell what street he is driving past. even with his eyes