Salt Lake Tribune | 1905-06-12 | Page 6 | A Meteoric Rush

A METEORIC RUSH. A railway train runs from Now York to Chicago In eighteen hours. The distance dis-tance covered is slightly under one thousand miles, making the speed nverage about fifty-five miles per hour, with no allowance for stops. Needless to 6ay. this Is the fastest long-distance, train In the world. But It Is not to hold the record for many days; for a rival company promises to put on a flyer which will make the distance In something under seventeen hours, or a running time, stops Included, of even sixty miles an hour. At last tho Impatient American la happy ln his travel. He always wants to be somewhere else, and bo there in a minute. Ho wants to travel without rest of mind or body, and as he la a large class, the faster the train the more popular. Luncheon In New York and breakfast break-fast tho next morning In Chicago Is a fascinating proposition. It is a mad running Jump from one placo to another, with the landscape flitting by like the action shown In a klnetcscope; and xvtlh tho colored porter bsglnnlng to brush the Chicago passenger's hat before the train gets out of the Jersey City yards. The man who predicted that the continent would be crossed in two and a half days by railway trains was not so much of a dreamer after all, The same speed from Chicago to Son Francisco Fran-cisco direct that is to be made from New York to Chicago, would cut tho ocean to ocean time to sixty hours, or a little less. Conservatives insist upon asking- Is It worth while? Fifty years ago our friendly critic from older countries, and our own philosophers, assumed that the American character would be strongsr, moro harmonious and more agreeable when It ahould acquire re- t pose, So much stress was laid upon the Idea, that It became almost a gospel gos-pel of social reform that wo should cultivate tho slower way, eo that we might take time for the culture and iha happiness which were thought to be denied because of our hurry-hurry tm-ihods. Instead of reposo wo have always cultivated speed. Moro Americans movo from place to place, and move faster, than any other people In th-world. th-world. They do more, and what they do Is worth doing; but always the question recurs. Aro we not sacrificing sacrific-ing soma of the stabilities, somo of the strength of Individual, and therefore National, life by our Incessant, Impatient Impa-tient and meteoric rush?