Caesars Column | Page 3

beyond the municipal limits.
But the wonderful city! Let me tell you of it.
As we approached it in our air-ship, coming from the east, we could see, a hundred miles
before we reached the continent, the radiance of its millions of magnetic lights, reflected
on the sky, like the glare of a great conflagration. These lights are not fed, as in the old
time, from electric dynamos, but the magnetism of the planet itself is harnessed for the
use of man. That marvelous earth-force which the Indians called "the dance of the
spirits," and civilized man designated "the aurora borealis," is now used to illuminate this
great metropolis, with a clear, soft, white light, like that of the full moon, but many times
brighter. And the force is so cunningly conserved that it is returned to the earth, without
any loss of magnetic power to the planet. Man has simply made a temporary loan from
nature for which he pays no interest.
Night and day are all one, for the magnetic light increases automatically as the day-light
wanes; and the business parts of the city swarm as much at midnight as at high noon. In
the old times, I am told, part of the streets was reserved for foot-paths for men and
women, while the middle was given up to horses and wheeled vehicles; and one could not
pass from side to side without danger of being trampled to death by the horses. But as the
city grew it was found that the pavements would not hold the mighty, surging multitudes;
they were crowded into the streets, and many accidents occurred. The authorities were at
length compelled to exclude all horses from the streets, in the business parts of the city,
and raise the central parts to a level with the sidewalks, and give them up to the exclusive
use of the pedestrians, erecting stone pillars here and there to divide the multitude
moving in one direction from those flowing in another. These streets are covered with
roofs of glass, which exclude the rain and snow, but not the air. And then the wonder and
glory of the shops! They surpass all description. Below all the business streets are
subterranean streets, where vast trains are drawn, by smokeless and noiseless electric
motors, some carrying passengers, others freight. At every street corner there are electric
elevators, by which passengers can ascend or descend to the trains. And high above the
house-tops, built on steel pillars, there are other railroads, not like the unsightly elevated
trains we saw pictures of in our school books, but crossing diagonally over the city, at a

great height, so as to best economize time and distance.
The whole territory between Broadway and the Bowery and Broome Street and Houston
Street is occupied by the depot grounds of the great inter-continental air-lines; and it is an
astonishing sight to see the ships ascending and descending, like monstrous birds, black
with swarming masses of passengers, to or from England, Europe, South America, the
Pacific Coast, Australia, China, India and Japan.
These air-lines are of two kinds: the anchored and the independent. The former are hung,
by revolving wheels, upon great wires suspended in the air; the wires held in place by
metallic balloons, fish-shaped, made of aluminium, and constructed to turn with the wind
so as to present always the least surface to the air-currents. These balloons, where the
lines cross the oceans, are secured to huge floating islands of timber, which are in turn
anchored to the bottom of the sea by four immense metallic cables, extending north,
south, east and west, and powerful enough to resist any storms. These artificial islands
contain dwellings, in which men reside, who keep up the supply of gas necessary for the
balloons. The independent air-lines are huge cigar-shaped balloons, unattached to the
earth, moving by electric power, with such tremendous speed and force as to be as little
affected by the winds as a cannon ball. In fact, unless the wind is directly ahead the sails
of the craft are so set as to take advantage of it like the sails of a ship; and the balloon
rises or falls, as the birds do, by the angle at which it is placed to the wind, the stream of
air forcing it up, or pressing it down, as the case may be. And just as the old-fashioned
steam-ships were provided with boats, in which the passengers were expected to take
refuge, if the ship was about to sink, so the upper decks of these air-vessels are supplied
with parachutes, from which are suspended boats; and in case of accident two sailors and
ten passengers are assigned to each parachute; and long practice has taught the bold
craftsmen to descend gently and