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The Pride of the Cities

Short Stories

"Fox-in-the-Morning"

A Bird of Bagdad

A Blackjack Bargainer

A Call Loan

A Chaparral Christmas Gift

A Chaparral Prince

A Comedy in Rubber

A Cosmopolite in a Cafe

A Departmental Case

A Dinner at--------*

A Double-Dyed Deceiver

A Fog in Santone

A Harlem Tragedy

A Lickpenny Lover

A Little Local Colour

A Little Talk about Mobs

A Madison Square Arabian Night

A Matter of Mean Elevation

A Midsummer Knight's Dream

A Midsummer Masquerade

A Municipal Report

A Newspaper Story

A Night in New Arabia

A Philistine in Bohemia

A Poor Rule

A Ramble in Aphasia

A Retrieved Reformation

A Ruler of Men

A Sacrifice Hit

A Service of Love

A Snapshot at the President

A Strange Story

A Technical Error

A Tempered Wind

According to Their Lights

After Twenty Years

An Adjustment of Nature

An Afternoon Miracle

An Apology

An Unfinished Christmas Story

An Unfinished Story

Aristocracy Versus Hash

Art and the Bronco

At Arms With Morpheus

Babes in the Jungle

Best-Seller

Between Rounds

Bexar Scrip No. 2692

Blind Man's Holiday

Brickdust Row

Buried Treasure

By Courier

Calloway's Code

Caught

Cherchez La Femme

Christmas by Injunction

Compliments of the Season

Confessions of a Humorist

Conscience in Art

Cupid a La Carte

Cupid's Exile Number Two

Dickey

Dougherty's Eye-Opener

Elsie in New York

Extradited from Bohemia

Fickle Fortune or How Gladys Hustled

Friends in San Rosario

From Each According to His Ability

From the Cabby's Seat

Georgia's Ruling

Girl

He Also Serves

Hearts and Crosses

Hearts and Hands

Helping the Other Fellow

Holding Up a Train

Hostages to Momus

Hygeia at the Solito

Innocents of Broadway

Jeff Peters as a Personal Magnet

Jimmy Hayes and Muriel

Law and Order

Let Me Feel Your Pulse

Little Speck in Garnered Fruit

Lord Oakhurst's Curse

Lost on Dress Parade

Madame Bo-Peep, of the Ranches

Makes the Whole World Kin

Mammon and the Archer

Man About Town

Masters of Arts

Memoirs of a Yellow Dog

Modern Rural Sports

Money Maze

Nemesis and the Candy Man

New York by Camp Fire Light

Next to Reading Matter

No Story

October and June

On Behalf of the Management

One Dollar's Worth

One Thousand Dollars

Out of Nazareth

Past One at Rooney's

Phoebe

Proof of the Pudding

Psyche and the Pskyscraper

Queries and Answers

Roads of Destiny

Roses, Ruses and Romance

Rouge et Noir

Round the Circle

Rus in Urbe

Schools and Schools

Seats of the Haughty

Shearing the Wolf

Ships

Shoes

Sisters of the Golden Circle

Smith

Sociology in Serge and Straw

Sound and Fury

Springtime a La Carte

Squaring the Circle

Strictly Business

Strictly Business

Suite Homes and Their Romance

Telemachus, Friend

The Admiral

The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes

The Assessor of Success

The Atavism of John Tom Little Bear

The Badge of Policeman O'Roon

The Brief Debut of Tildy

The Buyer From Cactus City

The Caballero's Way

The Cactus

The Caliph and the Cad

The Caliph, Cupid and the Clock

The Call of the Tame

The Chair of Philanthromathematics

The Champion of the Weather

The Church with an Overshot-Wheel

The City of Dreadful Night

The Clarion Call

The Coming-Out of Maggie

The Complete Life of John Hopkins

The Cop and the Anthem

The Count and the Wedding Guest

The Country of Elusion

The Day Resurgent

The Day We Celebrate

The Defeat of the City

The Detective Detector

The Diamond of Kali

The Discounters of Money

The Dog and the Playlet

The Door of Unrest

The Dream

The Duel

The Duplicity of Hargraves

The Easter of the Soul

The Emancipation of Billy

The Enchanted Kiss

The Enchanted Profile

The Ethics of Pig

The Exact Science of Matrimony

The Ferry of Unfulfilment

The Fifth Wheel

The Flag Paramount

The Fool-Killer

The Foreign Policy of Company 99

The Fourth in Salvador

The Friendly Call

The Furnished Room

The Gift of the Magi

The Girl and the Graft

The Girl and the Habit

The Gold That Glittered

The Greater Coney

The Green Door

The Guardian of the Accolade

The Guilty Party - An East Side Tragedy

The Halberdier of the Little Rheinschloss

The Hand that Riles the World

The Handbook of Hymen

The Harbinger

The Head-Hunter

The Hiding of Black Bill

The Higher Abdication

The Higher Pragmatism

The Hypotheses of Failure

The Indian Summer of Dry Valley Johnson

The Lady Higher Up

The Last Leaf

The Last of the Troubadours

The Lonesome Road

The Lost Blend

The Lotus And The Bottle

The Love-Philtre of Ikey Schoenstein

The Making of a New Yorker

The Man Higher Up

The Marionettes

The Marquis and Miss Sally

The Marry Month of May

The Memento

The Missing Chord

The Moment of Victory

The Octopus Marooned

The Passing of Black Eagle

The Pendulum

The Phonograph and the Graft

The Pimienta Pancakes

The Plutonian Fire

The Poet and the Peasant

The Pride of the Cities

The Princess and the Puma

The Prisoner of Zembla

The Proem

The Purple Dress

The Ransom of Mack

The Ransom of Red Chief

The Rathskeller and the Rose

The Red Roses of Tonia

The Reformation of Calliope

The Remnants of the Code

The Renaissance at Charleroi

The Roads We Take

The Robe of Peace

The Romance of a Busy Broker

The Rose of Dixie

The Rubaiyat of a Scotch Highball

The Rubber Plant's Story

The Shamrock and the Palm

The Shocks of Doom

The Skylight Room

The Sleuths

The Snow Man

The Social Triangle

The Song and the Sergeant

The Sparrows in Madison Square

The Sphinx Apple

The Tale of a Tainted Tenner

The Theory and the Hound

The Thing's the Play

The Third Ingredient

The Trimmed Lamp

The Unknown Quantity

The Unprofitable Servant

The Venturers

The Vitagraphoscope

The Voice of the City

The Whirligig of Life

The World and the Door

Thimble, Thimble

Tictocq

To Him Who Waits

Tobin's Palm

Tommy's Burglar

Tracked to Doom

Transformation of Martin Burney

Transients in Arcadia

Two Recalls

Two Renegades

Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen

Ulysses and the Dogman

Vanity and Some Sables

What You Want

While the Auto Waits

Whistling Dick's Christmas Stocking

Witches' Loaves







Said Mr. Kipling, "The cities are full of pride, challenging each to
each." Even so.

New York was empty. Two hundred thousand of its people were away for the
summer. Three million eight hundred thousand remained as caretakers and
to pay the bills of the absentees. But the two hundred thousand are an
expensive lot.

The New Yorker sat at a roof-garden table, ingesting solace through a
straw. His panama lay upon a chair. The July audience was scattered
among vacant seats as widely as outfielders when the champion batter steps
to the plate. Vaudeville happened at intervals. The breeze was cool from
the bay; around and above -- everywhere except on the stage -- were
stars. Glimpses were to be had of waiters, always disappearing, like
startled chamois. Prudent visitors who had ordered refreshments by 'phone
in the morning were now being served. The New Yorker was aware of certain
drawbacks to his comfort, but content beamed softly from his rimless
eyeglasses. His family was out of town. The drinks were warm; the ballet
was suffering from lack of both tune and talcum -- but his family would
not return until September.

Then up into the garden stumbled the man from Topaz City, Nevada. The
gloom of the solitary sightseer enwrapped him. Bereft of joy through
loneliness, he stalked with a widower's face through the halls of
pleasure. Thirst for human companionship possessed him as he panted in
the metropolitan draught. Straight to the New Yorker's table he steered.

The New Yorker, disarmed and made reckless by the lawless atmosphere of a
roof garden, decided upon utter abandonment of his life's traditions. He
resolved to shatter with one rash, dare-devil, impulsive, hair-brained act
the conventions that had hitherto been woven into his existence. Carrying
out this radical and precipitous inspiration he nodded slightly to the
stranger as he drew nearer the table.

The next moment found the man from Topaz City in the list of the New
Yorker's closest friends. He took a chair at the table, he gathered two
others for his feet, he tossed his broad-brimmed hat upon a fourth, and
told his life's history to his new-found pard.

The New Yorker warmed a little, as an apartment-house furnace warms when
the strawberry season begins. A waiter who came within hail in an
unguarded moment was captured and paroled on an errand to the Doctor Wiley
experimental station. The ballet was now in the midst of a musical
vagary, and danced upon the stage programmed as Bolivian peasants, clothed
in some portions of its anatomy as Norwegian fisher maidens, in others as
ladies-in-waiting of Marie Antoinette, historically denuded in other
portions so as to represent sea nymphs, and presenting the tout ensemble
of a social club of Central Park West housemaids at a fish fry.

"Been in the city long?" inquired the New Yorker, getting ready the exact
tip against the waiter's coming with large change from the bill.

"Me?" said the man from Topaz City. "Four days. Never in Topaz City, was
you?"

"I!" said the New Yorker. "I was never farther west than Eighth Avenue.
I had a brother who died on Ninth, but I met the cortege at Eighth. There
was a bunch of violets on the hearse, and the undertaker mentioned the
incident to avoid mistake. I cannot say that I am familiar with the West."

"Topaz City," said the man who occupied four chairs, "is one of the finest
towns in the world."

"I presume that you have seen the sights of the metropolis," said the New
Yorker, "Four days is not a sufficient length of time in which to view
even our most salient points of interest, but one can possibly form a
general impression. Our architectural supremacy is what generally strikes
visitors to our city most forcibly. Of course you have seen our Flatiron
Building. It is considered --"

"Saw it," said the man from Topaz City. "But you ought to come out our
way. It's mountainous, you know, and the ladies all wear short skirts for
climbing and --"

"Excuse me," said the New Yorker, "but that isn't exactly the point. New
York must be a wonderful revelation to a visitor from the West. Now, as
to our hotels --"

"Say," said the man from Topaz City, "that reminds me -- there were
sixteen stage robbers shot last year within twenty miles of --"

"I was speaking of hotels," said the New Yorker. "We lead Europe in that
respect. And as far as our leisure class is concerned we are far --"

"Oh, I don't know," interrupted the man from Topaz City. "There were
twelve tramps in our jail when I left home. I guess New York isn't so --"

"Beg pardon, you seem to misapprehend the idea. Of course, you visited
the Stock Exchange and Wall Street, where the --"

"Oh, yes," said the man from Topaz City, as he lighted a Pennsylvania
stogie, "and I want to tell you chat we've got the finest town marshal
west of the Rockies. Bill Rainer he took in five pickpockets out of the
crowd when Red Nose Thompson laid the cornerstone of his new saloon.
Topaz City don't allow --"

"Have another Rhine wine and seltzer," suggested the New Yorker. "I've
never been West, as I said; but there can't be any place out there to
compare with New York. As to the claims of Chicago I --"

"One man," said the Topazite -- "one man only has been murdered and robbed
in Topaz City in the last three --"

"Oh, I know what Chicago is," interposed the New Yorker. "Have you been
up Fifth Avenue to see the magnificent residences of our mil --"

"Seen 'em all. You ought to know Reub Stegall, the assessor of Topaz.
When old man Tilbury, that owns the only two-story house in town, tried to
swear his taxes from $6,000 down to $450.75, Reub buckled on his
forty-five and went down to see --"

"Yes, yes, but speaking of our great city -- one of its greatest features
is our superb police department. There is no body of men in the world
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 best galleries will find --"

"Back up," exclaimed the man from Topaz City. "There was a game last
month in our town in which $90,000 changed hands on a pair of --"

"Ta-romt-tara!" went the orchestra. The stage curtain, blushing pink at
the name "Asbestos" inscribed upon it, came down with a slow midsummer
movement. The audience trickled leisurely down the elevator and stairs.

On the sidewalk below, the New Yorker and the man from Topaz City shook
hands with alcoholic gravity. The elevated crashed raucously, surface
cars hummed and clanged, cabmen swore, newsboys shrieked, wheels clattered
ear-piercingly. The New Yorker conceived a happy thought, with which he
aspired to clinch the pre-eminence of his city.

"You must admit," said he, "that in the way of noise New York is far ahead
of any other --"

"Back to the everglades!" said the man from Topaz City. "In 1900, when
Sousa's band and the repeating candidate were in our town you couldn't --"

The rattle of an express wagon drowned the rest of the words.




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