They may work in the financial district downtown and never seen the extravagant plan tongs of Rockefeller Center-- the daffodils and grape hyacinths and birches of the flags trimmed to the wind on a fine morning in spring. Or they may work in a midtown office and may let a whole year swing round without sighting Governor's island from the sea wall. The commuter dies with tremendous mileage to his credit, but he is no rover. His entrances and exits are more devious than those in a prairie-dog village; and he calmly plays bridge while his train is buried in the mud at the bottom of the East River. The Long Island Rail Road alone carried forty million commuter last year; but many of them were the same fellow retracing his steps.
The terrain of New York is such that a resident sometimes travel farther, in the end, than a commuter. The journey of the composer living Berlin from Cherry Street in the lower East Side to an apartment uptown was through an alley and was only three or four miles in length; but it was like going three times around the world.