And what system of selection operates in the Department whereby this officer or that is chosen from among all his brethren for the paradisaical job of being beau of a fashionable crossing? And would you not think that a more uniform judgment would be exercised in the election of men to such Brummellian duties? Adonises in the traffic force I have, indeed, seen (there is one at Forty-second Street), but this chap of whom I have just been speaking (the whimsical whistler) certainly was not one of them. He was what is called "pie-faced." Hunched up his shoulders like an owl. Yet his ogling of loveliness in new spring attire was completely successful, was in no instance that I observed resented, was received with arch merriment. Indeed, his heavy, pink-tea attentions were obviously regarded as quite flattering by the fair recipients! As he let the tide break to cross the street it was plain, from bright glances backward, that he had fluttered little hearts which would smile upon him again. And so, in such a Romeo-like manner, does this bulky sentimentalist, armed with concealed weapons, have dalliance with the passing days. What you 'spose it is about him gives him his fascination in flashing eyes haughty to the rest of the masculine world--his bright buttons, or what? Yes; these curious and romantic little relationships between traffic cops on social duty, so to say, and their dainty admirers are not (in some instances at least) so transient as to be merely the exchange of roguish words and soft glances of the moment. There is that really august being of matinee-idol figure at--well, let us say at Forty-second Street. Sir Walter Raleigh could not with more courtliness pilot his fair freight across the Avenue. So it was the day after Christmas I saw not one but several of his young friends blushingly put dainty packages into his hands. Is there not an excellent O. Henry sort of story in this piquant city situation? Well, floating like a cork upon a river I drifted along up the Avenue. I passed a man I had not seen for several years. Yes; that certainly was the fellow I used to know. And yet he was an altogether different being now, too. The sort of a shock I got has perhaps also been experienced by you. Only a short time ago, it seemed to me, this friend of mine had been robust and ruddy, masterful and gay, in the prime of his years. I had somehow innocently expected him always to be so. Just as I find it very unreal to think of myself in any other way than I am now. Don't you? As to yourself, I mean. He was quite grey. His shoulders hung forward. His chest seemed to have fallen in on itself. His legs moved back and forth without ever altogether straightening out. He had a whipped look. Wrinkled clothes and dusty black derby hat, he was conspicuous in the peacockean scene. And yet on a time he had been, I knew, as much a conqueror of hearts as any policeman. So would it sometime be with me--like this?