EDITORIAL. 
319 
machines or selling the stock. It is passing strange that a news¬ 
paper which has in the past received so much from the horse 
interest of the country should not be able to find a kind word 
for the soliped in the last year of the nineteenth century. 
But there is no more danger of the displacement of the horse 
than there is of the extermination of man. The world is stead¬ 
ily becoming more populous, and the demands of trade and 
travel more diversified and exacting, so that new methods are 
constantly being introduced to meet the requirements of ever- 
changing conditions. Just a few years ago such a thing as the 
gigantic delivery system of the great department stores was not 
deemed within the possibilities of human undertakings. That 
the fair bargain-hunter would invade one of the large Sixth 
Avenue stores, spend two or three hours overhauling the various 
departments and finally wind up her mad career by purchasing 
two cakes of toilet soap for six cents, and order it sent C. O. D. 
to some lural address ten miles distant—was formerly recited 
only in a spirit of jest. To record it now is but to give the his¬ 
tory of many instances occurring daily. So that the delivery 
problem with such establishments has become a serious one. 
We are told that it costs one New York department house 
$150,000 per annum to deliver their sales to their customers. 
It is not strange, therefore, that they are trying to curtail this 
branch of expenditure. But, then, this was a new use for the 
horse, and there are many other places which he has filled by 
the increasing demands of commerce. It may be that in some 
of these avocations he will be supplanted by mechanical appli¬ 
ances when they become perfected and cheaper. The horse, 
however, has never been threatened with extermination in his 
true sphere, any more than American mothers are in danger of 
being substituted by the incubator. As a pleasure vehicle it 
may be possible to pass over good roads with speed and comfort 
in the automobile, but when the novelty wears away it will lack 
the life, interest and pleasure of man’s best friend. 
We advise our Western correspondent, therefore, to pay no 
heed to the wild vaporings of the stock-kiters and sensation- 
