THE INDIAN POLE
Every street has a soul of its own. Somewhere in its course it will betray its secret ideals and preferences. I like to imagine that the soul of Callowhill street has something to do with beer. Like a battered citizen who has fallen upon doleful days, Callowhill street solaces itself with the amber.
Between Tenth and Fourth streets Callowhill numbers at least a dozen pubs, not to enumerate a score of "cider saloons." A soft breath of hops seems to haunt the air, and the trucks unloading kegs into cellars give promise of quenchers to come. Generally one may meet along those pavements certain rusty brothers who have obviously submitted themselves to the tramplings of the brewer's great horses, as Homer Rodeheaver's anthem puts it.
Callowhill street, like so much of Philadelphia's old and gentle beauty, is in a downward pang, at any rate so far as the picturesque is concerned. It is curious to see those comely old dwellings, with their fluted dormer windows, their marble facings and dusty fanlights, standing in faded dignity and wistfulness among factories, breweries and railroad spurs. Down their narrow side alleys one may catch a glimpse of greenery (generally the ailanthus, that slummish tree that haunts city back yards and seems to have such an affinity for red brick) . If one has a taste for poking and exploring,
