But the commuter, though simple and anxious to be pleased, is shrewdly alert.  Every now and then they shuffle the trains at Jamaica just to keep him guessing and sharpen his faculty of judging whether this train goes to Brooklyn or Penn Station.  His decisions have to be made rapidly.  We are speaking now of Long Island commuters, whom we know best; but commuters are the same wherever you find them.  The Jersey commuter has had his own celebrant in Joyce Kilmer, and we hope that he knows Joyce’s pleasant essay on the subject which was published in that little book, “The Circus and Other Essays.”  But we gain-say the right of Staten Islanders to be classed as commuters.  These are a proud and active sort who are really seafarers, not commuters.  Fogs and ice floes make them blench a little; but the less romantic troubles of broken brake-shoes leave them unscotched.

Of Long Island commuters there are two classes:  those who travel to Penn Station, those who travel to Brooklyn.  Let it not be denied, there is a certain air of aristocracy about the Penn Station clique that we cannot waive.  Their tastes are more delicate.  The train-boy from Penn Station cries aloud “Choice, delicious apples,” which seems to us almost an affectation compared to the hoarse yell of our Brooklyn news-agents imploring “Have a comic cartoon book, ’Mutt and Jeff,’ ‘Bringing Up Father,’ choclut-covered cherries!” The club cars all go to Penn Station:  there would be a general apoplexy in the lowly terminal at Atlantic Avenue if one of those vehicles were seen there.  People are often seen (on the Penn Station branch) who look exactly like the advertisements in Vanity Fair.  Yet we, for our humility, have treasures of our own, such as the brightly lighted little shops along Atlantic Avenue and a station with the poetic name of Autumn Avenue.  The Brooklyn commuter points with pride to his monthly ticket, which is distinguished from that of the Penn Station nobility by a red badge of courage—­a bright red stripe.  On the Penn Station branch they often punch the tickets with little diamond-shaped holes; but on our line the punch is in the form of a heart.

When the humble commuter who is accustomed to travelling via Brooklyn is diverted from his accustomed orbit, and goes by way of the Pennsylvania Station, what surprising excitements are his.  The enormousness of the crowd at Penn Station around 5 P.M. causes him to realize that what he had thought, in his innocent Brooklyn fashion, was a considerable mob, was nothing more than a trifling scuffle.  But he notes with pleasure the Penn Station habit of letting people through the gate before the train comes in, so that one may stand in comparative comfort and coolness downstairs on the train platform.  Here a vision of luxury greets his eyes that could not possibly be imagined at the Brooklyn terminal—­the Lehigh Valley dining car that stands on a neighbouring track, the pink candles lit on the tables, the shining water