Baedeker is quite right about that. He might also have added that the "Windy City" is not so windy as New York, and that the old legend, now almost forgotten, to the effect that Chicago girls have big feet is equally untrue. There is still some wind in Chicago; thanks to it and to the present mode in dress, I was able to assure myself quite definitely upon the size of Chicago feet. I not only saw them upon the streets; I saw them also at dances: twinkling, slippered feet as small as any in the land; and, again owing to the present mode, I saw not only pretty feet, but also--However, I am digressing. That is enough about feet. I fear I have already let them run away with me. * * * * * A friend of mine who visited Chicago for the first time, a year ago, came back appreciative of her wonders, but declaring her provincial. "Why do you say provincial?" I asked. "Because you can't pick up a taxi in the street," he said. And it is true. I was chagrined at his discovery--not so much because of its truth, however, as because it was the discovery of a New Yorker. I always defend Chicago against New Yorkers, for I love the place, partly for itself and partly because I was born and spent my boyhood there. I know a great many other ex-Chicagoans who now live in New York, as I do, and I have noticed with amusement that the side we take depends upon the society in which we are. If we are with Chicagoans, we defend New York; if with New Yorkers, we defend Chicago. We are like those people in the circus who stand upon the backs of two horses at once. Only among ourselves do we go in for candor. The other day I met a man and his wife, transplanted Chicagoans, on the street in New York. "How long have you been here?" I asked. "Three years," said the husband. "Why did you come?" "For business reasons." "How do you like the change?" The husband hesitated. "Well, I've done a great deal better here than I ever did in Chicago," he said. "How do you like it?" I asked the wife. "New York gives us more advantages," she said, "but I prefer Chicago people." "Would you like to go back?" The wife hesitated, but the husband shook his head. "No," he replied, "there's something about New York that gets into your blood. To go back to Chicago would seem like retrograding." * * * * * Among my notes I find the record of a conversation with a New York girl who married a Chicago man and went out there to live.