give pointers to a civet cat or a jackdaw.  He is the man who has chased Bohemia about the town from rathskeller to roof garden and from Hester street to Harlem until you can’t find a place in the city where they don’t cut their spaghetti with a knife.  Your ‘Man About Town’ has done that.  He is always on the scent of something new.  He is curiosity, impudence and omnipresence.  Hansoms were made for him, and gold-banded cigars; and the curse of music at dinner.  There are not so many of him; but his minority report is adopted everywhere.

“I’m glad you brought up the subject; I’ve felt the influence of this nocturnal blight upon our city, but I never thought to analyse it before.  I can see now that your ‘Man About Town’ should have been classified long ago.  In his wake spring up wine agents and cloak models; and the orchestra plays ‘Let’s All Go Up to Maud’s’ for him, by request, instead of Haendel.  He makes his rounds every evening; while you and I see the elephant once a week.  When the cigar store is raided, he winks at the officer, familiar with his ground, and walks away immune, while you and I search among the Presidents for names, and among the stars for addresses to give the desk sergeant.”

My friend, the critic, paused to acquire breath for fresh eloquence.  I seized my advantage.

“You have classified him,” I cried with joy.  “You have painted his portrait in the gallery of city types.  But I must meet one face to face.  I must study the Man About Town at first hand.  Where shall I find him?  How shall I know him?”

Without seeming to hear me, the critic went on.  And his cab-driver was waiting for his fare, too.

“He is the sublimated essence of Butt-in; the refined, intrinsic extract of Rubber; the concentrated, purified, irrefutable, unavoidable spirit of Curiosity and Inquisitiveness.  A new sensation is the breath in his nostrils; when his experience is exhausted he explores new fields with the indefatigability of a—­”

“Excuse me,” I interrupted, “but can you produce one of this type?  It is a new thing to me.  I must study it.  I will search the town over until I find one.  Its habitat must be here on Broadway.”

“I am about to dine here,” said my friend.  “Come inside, and if there is a Man About Town present I will point him out to you.  I know most of the regular patrons here.”

“I am not dining yet,” I said to him.  “You will excuse me.  I am going to find my Man About Town this night if I have to rake New York from the Battery to Little Coney Island.”

I left the hotel and walked down Broadway.  The pursuit of my type gave a pleasant savour of life and interest to the air I breathed.  I was glad to be in a city so great, so complex and diversified.  Leisurely and with something of an air I strolled along with my heart expanding at the thought that I was a citizen of great Gotham, a sharer in its magnificence and pleasures, a partaker in its glory and prestige.