Brilliant will be the lighting of the cars and stations; the tunnels, too, are to be illuminated. Fresh air will be obtained by the frequent movements of the trains through the tunnels, while smoke and smuts will, of course, become things of the past. The stations, with their wide and roomy platforms, will in some cases be lengthened by fifty feet to accommodate the three-hundred-and-fifty-feet-long trains, and be thoroughly cleansed and repainted, and the tunnels may possibly be whitened by means of “spraying”--the principle adopted at the Chicago Exhibition for the finials of the pavilions. The question of classes, fares, and tickets has not yet been settled, but we may assume that the system adopted will be somewhat like that of the Tube. The entire project closely resembles the Metropolitan Underground Railway of Paris, and the Boston Subway. Lifts are not at present contemplated, and probably their absence will be no great loss to active travellers, nor even to the “old, subdued, and slow,” for trains will so quickly succeed one another that the missing of one will involve no serious delay. Possibly, however, as time goes on, some new and convenient form of sloping footway may be adopted. But alas! for the lovers of the beautiful, the directors, we are told, “have not decided that they will be warranted in sacrificing, on æsthetic grounds, the revenue derived from advertisements.” Then, again, as there will be little or no waiting, even the most impatient of _voyageurs_ will hardly need the diversion obtained by a trial of the omnipresent penny-in-the-slot machines, or the contemplation of the numerous works of art displayed on the station walls. They will not even need the bookstalls, much less to gape at the contents-bills of the daily paper. And, provided the glass roofs be kept clean, and the atmosphere innocent of smoke and gas, might not the stations--sheltered as they are from the vagaries of weather, and brilliantly lighted--be transformed into modified winter gardens, with sturdy flowers and shrubs filling up nooks and corners, and bold paintings (frequently renewed) of distant lands, seascapes, and historical subjects, in the recesses now covered by “Reckitt’s Blue,” etc.? The frequent stopping of trains would be actually welcomed, and people would travel by the “Circle” for the sake of seeing the novelties! In fact, every station might be converted into a thing of beauty. One other suggestion for the directors of the new Inner Circle. Cannot something be contrived in the new cars to effectually deaden the sound of the closing and opening of doors, so irritating to modern nerves, and unpleasantly associated with the “banging” in the old carriages, and the “clashing” of the telescopics in the Tubes. THE NEW METROPOLITAN RAILWAY