Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1928-07-01

flung aside to make room for wider
roads and newer structures that will
probably get grubbed up and flung
aside after age has mellowed them
into sentiment and memories for old
Sters who are the children OF today
Which Is perfectly all right, seeing 1t
can't be prevented.
You may have noticed that even the
ramShackle old car track along the
Bladensburg road has given way To
panels of grass and flowers, with gay
new buses on the side. And with this
change. with the wonder-future that
is coming to the wooded hills of Mount
Hamilton and the already arrived houses
set in rows on streets where dumps
used to be, the old-time mile, that used
to begin at the H street car line and
end at Mount Olivet Cemetery. can nc
longer be called The Way of the
Sorrowful" by those who. for many
years, had to plod lonely way to loved
ones who sleep i'll the green silence
behind the high iron gates.
Except on Memorial days, when the
old-time street would be broken out
in a rash of flower vendors, sandwich
and pop carts. and vehicles to charge
dime going and coming, for the
pilgrims that tramped ceaselessly from
the early hour the gates opened until
the dusk, when they shut. 1t was a
way of uneven bricks that staggered
along as if it were not quite SOBER
with its Sunken stretches of dump
heaps on one side, enlivened with
tombStoneS III a marble yard, and
across, all the way. acres OF neglected
commons with an occasional horse
taking his Sunday off, and beyond that,
the blessed wooded hills--with mil
dewy For Sale" signs that seemed
pathetically absurd -- until progress
came along. But now, the atmosphere
of mournfulness has changed to light
some very-dayneSs--like a widow tax
ing off her weeds. And instead of
prayers, murmured along the way, and
mutual consultations, you might have
heard a bit of talk like this-if you
had been there, say, last Sunday:
A stylish girl in sport toggery and a
brisk young man in plus-fours-both
waiting outside the gate for bus to
take them to some more jovial point
than the place of shafts and slabs
that were only vaults, were bandying
comments as one longtime pilgrim
came along,
''Oh, yes, she made a great to-do.
cleaning off her own graves and deco
rating them with flowers, but when
she was through, she didn't do a thing
but roll her trash in ball and throw
it on grave that had no one to care
for it wouldn't marry girl like that
If every hair on her head was dia-
mond."
And the girl tipped back:
What do you suppose girl with
diamonds would want with mutt like
you?"
There may have been more to it, but
enough is always enough-eXcept that
If it had not been for progress, with its
trim cheerfulness and passing bus, nei-
Their the girl nor the young man would
likely have been there. They would
have left the little old-time mile TO the
plodding pilgrims who walked with
grieved hearts to pray beside their loved
ones, asleep in the green silence behind
the high iron gates.
And it may be that the Importance
of a boulevard guarded by many cleo
trio standards may have accounted for
another party - two women 49, talking
over new site which one of them had
recently purchased.
II always dreaded having to be buried
in Mount Olivet, because it was so dead
like out here at nights, but after
bought this grave next the road, with
the lights shining all night. and the
school children playing around at re-
cess, think I shall feel real cheerful.
And look at the collisions that happen
to automobiles whizzing by in the wee
hours after q iunket in Baltimore-I'll
be right in the front row."
The other woman must have been a
pilgrim of the old, Sorrowful days, for
she said. reproachfully pious:
MY dear, you surely know that you
viii not be here. Your soul will
have" And as the bus pulled up
to give three women chance at one
seat. the party who was listening in
spryed aboard, without learning the To-
cation of the site owners soul-after 1t
had made certain journey.