in his
determination to get grade crossings abolished in Massachusetts.

Having first personally interviewed the presidents of several great
railroads leading out from Boston, and finding one or two heartily in
favor of the idea, two or three more not in opposition, and scarcely a
majority opposed, he persevered. He pressed the matter, and the bill
was carried and signed by the governor. It provided that within a term
of years all grade crossings in Massachusetts should be abolished.
This will require the expenditure of many millions of dollars, the
sinking or elevating of tracks, and the making of tunnels and bridges.
The work was nobly begun. At this moment, in May, 1898, the progress
is steadily forward to the great consummation.

Though his measure for the protection of human life received very
little popular notice, Carleton counted it one of the best things that
God had allowed him to do. And certainly, among the noble and truly
Christian measures for the good of society, in this last decade of the
century, the work done by Lorenzo Coffin in Iowa, as well as in the
country at large, and by Senator Charles Carleton Coffin in
Massachusetts,--a State whose example will be followed by
others,--must ever be remembered by the grateful student of social
progress. Surely, Carleton proved himself not merely a politician, but
a statesman.

The welfare of the city of Boston was ever dear to Carleton's heart.
He gave a great deal of time and thought to thinking out problems
affecting its welfare, and hence was often a welcome speaker at club
meetings, which are so numerous, so delightful, and, certainly, in
their number, peculiar to Boston. He wrote for the press, giving his
views freely, whenever any vital question was before the people. This
often entailed severe labor and the sacrifice of time to one who could
never boast very much of this world's goods.

When the writer first, in 1886, came to Boston to live, he found the
horse everywhere in the city; when he left it in 1893 there was only
the trolley. The motor power was carried through the air from a
central source. It is even yet, however, a test of one's knowledge of
Boston--a city not laid out by William Penn, but by cows and admirers
of crookedness--to understand the street-car system of the city. Most
of the street passenger lines fell gradually into the hands of one
great corporation, which vastly improved the service, enlarging and
making more comfortable,