eciate certain other weatherworn
structures of great beauty. I have seen photographs of an old Baptist
Church with a fine (and not at all Baptist-looking) portico and fluted
columns, which was torn down to make room for the present stupidly
commonplace Baptist church: and I have seen pictures of the beautiful
old town hall which was recently supplanted by an ignorantly ordinary
town building of yellow pressed brick. The destruction of these two
early buildings represents an irreparable loss to Columbus, and it is to
be hoped that the town will some day be sufficiently enlightened to
know that this is true and to regret that it did not restore and enlarge
them instead of tearing them down.

Until a decade or two ago Columbus had, so far as I can learn, but four
streets possessing names: Main Street, Market Street, College Street,
and Catfish Alley, all other streets being known as "the street that
Mrs. Billups, or Mrs. Sykes, or Mrs. Humphries, or Mrs. Some-one-else
lives on."

Market and Main are business streets--at least they are so where they
cross--and, like the other streets, are wide. They are lined with brick
buildings few if any of them more than three stories in height, and it
was in one of these buildings, on Main Street, that we found the Bell
Cafe--advertised as "the most exclusive cafe in the State."

Being in search of breakfast rather than exclusiveness, we did not sit
at one of the tables, but at the long lunch counter, where we were
quickly served.

After breakfast we felt strong enough to look at picture post cards, and
to that end visited first "Cheap Joe's" and then the shop of Mr.
Divilbis, where newspapers, magazines, sporting goods, cameras, and all
such things, are sold. Having viewed post cards picturing such scenes as
"Main Street looking north," "The 1st Baptist Church," and "Steamer
_America_, Tombigbee River," we were about to depart, when our attention
was drawn to a telephonic conversation which had started between Mr.
Divilbis's clerk and a customer who was thinking of going in for the
game of lawn tennis. The half of the conversation which was audible to
us proved entertaining, and we dallied, eavesdropping.

The clerk began by recommending tennis. "Yes," he said, "that would be
very nice. Everybody is playing tennis now."

But that got him into trouble, for after a pause he said: "I'm sorry I
can't tell you everything about it. I don't play tennis myself. Al could
tell you, thoug