and heat we are also in the hands of
officials, dozens of passengers being made to suffer for the caprices of
one of their number, or the taste of some captious invalid. In other
lands the rights of minorities are often ignored. With us it is the
contrary. One sniffling school-girl who prefers a temperature of 80
degrees can force a car full of people to swelter in an atmosphere that
is death to them, because she refuses either to put on her wraps or to
have a window opened.

Street railways are torture-chambers where we slaves are made to suffer
in another way. You must begin to reel and plunge towards the door at
least two blocks before your destination, so as to leap to the ground
when the car slows up; otherwise the conductor will be offended with you,
and carry you several squares too far, or with a jocose "Step lively,"
will grasp your elbow and shoot you out. Any one who should sit quietly
in his place until the vehicle had come to a full stop, would be regarded
by the slave-driver and his cargo as a _poseur_ who was assuming airs.

The idea that cars and boats exist for the convenience of the public was
exploded long ago. We are made, dozens of times a day, to feel that this
is no longer the case. It is, on the contrary, brought vividly home to
us that such conveyances are money making machines in the possession of
powerful corporations (to whom we, in our debasement, have handed over
the freedom of our streets and rivers), and are run in the interest and
at the discretion of their owners.

It is not only before the great and the powerful that we bow in
submission. The shop-girl is another tyrant who has planted her foot
firmly on the neck of the nation. She respects neither sex nor age.
Ensconced behind the bulwark of her counter, she scorns to notice humble
aspirants until they have performed a preliminary penance; a time she
fills up in cheerful conversation addressed to other young tyrants, only
deciding to notice customers when she sees their last grain of patience
is exhausted. She is often of a merry mood, and if anything about your
appearance or manner strikes her critical sense as amusing, will laugh
gayly with her companions at your expense.

A French gentleman who speaks our language correctly but with some
accent, told me that he found it impossible to get served in our stores,
the shop-girls bursting with laughter before he could make his wants
known.

Not long ago I was at the Compag