One of his chief treasures is an automatic piano, upon which he rolls off selections from Wagner’s operas.  He likes the music of the great German because, as he has often told me, it stirs his imagination, thereby helping him to solve business problems and make business plans.

The thing he most abhors is general conversation, and he is never so amusing—­so pathetically and unconsciously amusing—­as when trying to take part in general conversation and at the same time to conceal the writhings of his tortured spirit.  There is but one thing which will drive him to attempt the feat, and that is the necessity of making himself agreeable to some man, or the wife of some man, from whom he wishes to get business.

The census of 1910 gave Birmingham a population of 132,000, and it is estimated that since that time the population has increased by 50,000.  Birmingham not only knows that it is growing, but believes in trying to make ready in advance for future growth.  It gives one the impression that it is rather ahead of its housing problems than behind them.  Its area, for instance, is about as great as that of Boston or Cleveland, and its hotels may be compared with the hotels of those cities.  If it has not so many clubs as Atlanta, it has, at least, all the clubs it needs; and if it has not so many skyscrapers as New York, it has several which would fit nicely into the Wall Street district.  Moreover, the tall buildings of Birmingham lose nothing in height by contrast with the older buildings, three or four stories high, which surround them, giving the business district something of that look which hangs about a boy who has outgrown his clothing.  Nor are the vehicles and street crowds, altogether in consonance, as yet, with the fine office buildings of the city, for many of the motors standing at the curb have about them that gray, rural look which comes of much mud and infrequent washing, and the idlers who lean against the rich facades of granite and marble are entirely out of the picture, for they look precisely like the idlers who lean against the wooden posts of country railroad station platforms.

Such curious contrasts as these may be noted everywhere.  For instance, Birmingham has been so busy paving the streets that it seems quite to have forgotten to put up street signs.  Also, not far from the majestic Tutwiler Hotel, and the imposing apartment building called the Ridgely, the front of which occupies a full block, is a park so ill kept that it would be a disgrace to the city but for the obvious fact that the city is growing and wide-awake, and will, of course, attend to the park when it can find the time.  Here are, I believe, the only public monuments Birmingham contains.  One is a Confederate monument in the form of an obelisk, and the other two are statues erected in memory of Mary A. Cahalan, for many years principal of the Powell School, and of William Elias B. Davis, a distinguished surgeon.  Workers in