Show This Is a Very Little Old World3 The extreme diminutiveness of the world is a thing that has often surprised sur-prised me during the quarter of a century that I have been going up and down the world said Franlc M Pancousf a traveling man whose territory IB the entire globe for he sells bridges and trestles and structural steel Chancing In I many different parts of the earth upon people I never expected tosee more than once is an experience I have had so often that It has served to shrivel my world into i an exceedingly contracted affair For example four years ago I voyaged up the west coast from La Llbertad on a coffee freighter The only other passenger on the steamer besides myself wait a planter from Guatemala middleaged Central American and n very accomplished ac-complished and entertaining man We smoked talked played cards and ate and < drank In each others company all the way up to San Francisco and enjoyed the trip thoroughly He told me that he was starting out on a little tour of pleasure pleas-ure but did not mention where he was going We parted at the Palace hotel In San Francisco with mutual regret I made a straight Jump for New York A week after I got there I went down to the beach one evening for some air and muHic 1 was taking a bite alone on the hotel veranda when who should come strolling up to my table with a smile and his eternal yellow cigarette but 7iiy Guatemalan friend I was glad to see him He bade me adlos In New York In the morning saying that he was f going to take a steamer that same day So was 1 In the afternoon when I went aboard the Galvcston steamer I bumped one oC my grips against a man In a duck suit and a pith helmet who was standing at the starboard rail smoking smok-ing a yellow cigarette I turned to apologize and my friend from Guatemala smiled at me In his beard We had a pretty good time together on the eightday run to Galveston and put up In adjoining rooms at the Beach hotel outside the city which has since been destroyed by fire I finished my business In Galveston in a day and then with the Central American had a week of rest and fun on the gulf sands and In the city Then my concern summoned me back to New York and once more after a mutual exchange of regrets we separated Awhile A-while after my return to New York a relative of mine a young fellow from the western part of New York State turned up and I showed him about the town a bit Among the restaurants we visited was a Chinese place in Mott street where we had one of those weird chopstick feeds We hadnt more than begun before my friend from Central America strolled In and greeted me Just as 1C we had made an appointment to meet each other at the Chinese restaurant that evening When I left him at his uptown hotel at midnIght I figured that the chances of my runnlniz across him again were pretty slim for 1 was booked for a trip to Japan on a trcstlefeelling expedition within a week or so and tho Guatemalan told me that he himself was cit on a long Journey although he didnt mention whither that Journey was going to take him Again it was adlos A month later I was writing my name on the register of the Grand hotel In Yokohama when I felt a touch on the shoulder I turned about and looked in the placid black bearded phiz of iny Guatemalan planter lie had taken another route for it but was Just getting In nevertheless T havent run across him since I left Japan on that trip ImL I T wouldnt be surprised to meet up with him on Pennsylvania avenue this evening Tt is such experiences as these that have caused me to lose my onceprofound Impression of the vastness of the world Washington Post |