Lucky brokers, capitalists, contractors, grocery-men, successful
political strikers, rich butchers, dry goods' folk, &c. And on a large
proportion of these vehicles, on panels or horse-trappings, were
conspicuously borne _heraldic family crests_. (Can this really be
true?) In wish and willingness (and if that were so, what matter about
the reality?) titles of nobility, with a court and spheres fit for the
capitalists, the highly educated, and the carriage-riding classes--to
fence them off from "the common people"--were the heart's desire of
the "good society" of our great cities--aye, of North and South.
So much for my police friend's speculations--which rather took me
aback--and which I have thought I would just print as he gave them (as
a doctor records symptoms.)
PLATE GLASS NOTES
_St. Louis, Missouri, November, '79_.--What do you think I find
manufactur'd out here--and of a kind the clearest and largest, best,
and the most finish'd and luxurious in the world--and with ample
demand for it too? _Plate glass_! One would suppose that was the last
dainty outcome of an old, almost effete-growing civilization; and yet
here it is, a few miles from St. Louis, on a charming little river,
in the wilds of the West, near the Mississippi. I went down that
way to-day by the Iron Mountain Railroad--was switch'd off on a
side-track four miles through woods and ravines, to Swash Creek,
so-call'd, and there found Crystal city, and immense Glass Works,
built (and evidently built to stay) right in the pleasant rolling
forest.
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