PUPPETS THROUGH AMERICA
at the very bottom of Manhattan Island, that we were seized
with the bright idea of walking back to the Wellington
Hotel at ssth Street. By this means we expected to see
- quite a lot of the city, how much we did not realise until
after an hour's walking on the fourteen miles long Broad-
way we discovered that we were still a long way from the
hotel, and not far on with the exploration of Broadway. But
we had seen something—the older New York growing a
little shabby, quantities of working people not too flourish-
ing to look at, and two little processions of strike pickets
demonstrating on the pavement outside their shops in which
sit-down strikes were in progress. One of these, an awful
file of a dozen blind workers, advertising their strike with
placards, and, with their dreadful, sickly bodies and blind
eyes advertising the cruelty of a society that could expect
them to work at all. This was not the gay Broadway we
had expected, not the Great White Way of the theatre
world. There was nothing entertaining or amusing in it at
all.
After this experience we were entertained restfully in a
private house of an older regime, and caught a brief impres-
sion of the staid elegance and taste of the past, of beautiful
chairs and tables, of delightful china, and portraits by
American artists on the walls. But even here, from the
point of view of tourist amusement, we were disturbed by
the tale of a recent battle with gunmen in the street, and
how the press of sightseers had been so great that the
operations of the police had been held up for five hours, and
when what was left of the criminals were arrested, the car,
in which they were placed, was nearly overturned by the
crowd.
And I was disturbed by the efficient but sinister control
of the photographers who came to the hotel with a portable
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