Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-02-28
THIS AND THAT
BY CHARLES E. TRACEWELL.

Where are all the people on the
streets going?
This is a question which some of Ills
are not able to answer to our own sat-
isfaction.
1t is easy enough to give glib re-
| plies, such as, oh, they are going
home!" or "They are going to Office. -
or They are going some place just as
| you are"
These solutions are true enough, but
| they do not begin to touch the nub of
sands upon thousands Of human beings
endlessly streaming somewhere.
| No doubt the city has grown be-
You'd us.
Maybe those of us who sometimes
stand gawking on street corners, watch
| ing the hundreds of automobiles go
down Thirteenth street, or along Six
| teenth street, or Connecticut avenue
during the rush hours-maybe We are
small town, by birth and heritage.
We have not lost the capacity for
wonder, in other words.
X x X
1t is said that no man can count q
million. and If there is a vestige of
truth in that, perhaps it is no wonder
that we cannot altogether grasp half
million people.
New York would only be more of the
same thing, more people. more cars.
more jamming, more confusion. We
refuse to bow to the immensely of New
York
All of Manhattan'S millions are
streaming to work and back to their
homes again, that is all. 1t is the old
process, endlessly repeated, on dry, cold
mornings, and wet mornings, and
gloomy mornings. and at dusk, and for
the theater and back home again.
Still there remains in our provincial
| minds mental refusal to accept them
all. They are too many of them We
would prefer to know the baker by
name, and to Be able to call the banker
jim. and the butcher John, or maybe
Jack.
AS it is, all we can do is stand on the
corner and watch them go by. We rec
| ognize the baker, because his name is
on his wagon; We know the banker be-
| cause We see him enter his building,
and there can be no mistaking him
he looks every inch a banker; as for
the butcher. he slides by in his small
car, with several rounds of beef hang
ing perilously over the door.
X X
In modern city there is a vacuum
in many minds and hearts created bv
the inability to know personally more
than small per centum of the total
population
This feeling will never exist in the
seu-SatiSfled man or woman who
somehow feels that Nature rather out
did itself with them. There are thou
sands Of these persons, of course. Per-
maps they are to be congratulated.
But we have TO do here with the
man, or woman-and there are many
thousands of this type, too-who is
interested in everything he sees, and
in all the human beings he meets
To such person the stream of pco-
pie on the streets is an endless drama
veritable moving picture, replete
with color, life and interest.
1t is film with the flicker left out.
a reel without end. as it seems without
beginning. The difference is that the
crowd goes all ways a. once. and has
thousands Of beginnings and thousands
Of endings.
1t is interesting to stand on a down
town corner and watch them go by
This is one of the good points of
the public transit lines, that one may,
while waiting fer bus or car, have
time to study the crowds.
Thus no time is lost. Even those
who have not imbibed the modern doc
trine OF the loss of time" are more
or less affected by 1t, and feel better,
everything taken into consideration, If
they have not violated its precepts.
When one lis waiting for a public