Page:Morley--Travels in Philadelphia.djvu/108



is a pleasant thoroughfare for wandering on a cool summer morning about eight-thirty of the clock. It has been my diversion, lately, to get off the Reading train at the Spring Garden Station and walk to the office from there instead of pursuing the too familiar route from the Terminal. Try it some day, you victims of habit. To start the day by a little variation of routine is an excellent excitement for the mind.

That after-breakfast period, before the heat begins, has a freshness and easy vigor of its own. Housewives are out scrubbing the white marble steps; second-hand furniture dealers have spread their pieces on the pavement for better inspection and sit in their morris chairs by the curb to read the morning paper. Presumably the more ease and comfort they show the more plainly the desirability of a second-hand morris chair will be impressed on the passer-by; such is the psychology of their apparent indolence. A fire engine with maroon chassis and bright silver boiler rumbles comfortably back to its station after putting out a fire somewhere. The barbers are out winding up the clock-work that keeps their red and white striped emblems revolving. And here and there on the pavement, reclining with rich relish