that can equal it for--"

"That waiter gets around like a Langley flying machine," remarked the
man from Topaz City, thirstily. "We've got men in our town, too, worth
$400,000. There's old Bill Withers and Colonel Metcalf and--"

"Have you seen Broadway at night?" asked the New Yorker, courteously.
"There are few streets in the world that can compare with it. When the
electrics are shining and the pavements are alive with two hurrying
streams of elegantly clothed men and beautiful women attired in
the costliest costumes that wind in and out in a close maze of
expensively--"

"Never knew but one case in Topaz City," said the man from the West.
"Jim Bailey, our mayor, had his watch and chain and $235 in cash taken
from his pocket while--"

"That's another matter," said the New Yorker. "While you are in
our city you should avail yourself of every opportunity to see its
wonders. Our rapid transit system--"

"If you was out in Topaz," broke in the man from there, "I could show
you a whole cemetery full of people that got killed accidentally.
Talking about mangling folks up! why, when Berry Rogers turned loose
that old double-barrelled shot-gun of his loaded with slugs at
anybody--"

"Here, waiter!" called the New Yorker. "Two more of the same. It
is acknowledged by every one that our city is the centre of art,
and literature, and learning. Take, for instance, our after-dinner
speakers. Where else in the country would you find such wit and
eloquence as emanate from Depew and Ford, and--"

"If you take the papers," interrupted the Westerner, "you must have
read of Pete Webster's daughter. The Websters live two blocks north of
the court-house in Topaz City. Miss Tillie Webster, she slept forty
days and nights without waking up. The doctors said that--"

"Pass the matches, please," said the New Yorker. "Have you observed
the expedition with which new buildings are being run up in New York?
Improved inventions in steel framework and--"

"I noticed," said the Nevadian, "that the statistics of Topaz City
showed only one carpenter crushed by falling timbers last year and he
was caught in a cyclone."

"They abuse our sky line," continued the New Yorker, "and it is likely
that we are not yet artistic in the construction of our buildings. But
I can safely assert that we lead in pictorial and decorative art. In
some of our houses can be found masterpieces in the way of paintings
and sculpture. One who has the entree to our