"Coelum non animum mutat, which, in good American, means that it is the same old city on the level, and only changes its sky-line," he chortled. "Bet you a five-spot to a nickel I'll walk blindfolded along Twenty-third Street from the Hoboken Ferry any time of the day, and take the correct turn into Broadway, bar being run over by a taxi or street-car at the crossings."
"I'll take the same odds and do that myself. How could any normal human being miss the rattle of the Sixth Avenue Elevated?"
Devar's forehead wrinkled with surprise.
"Hello, there! Hold on! How often have you told me that you had never seen New York since you were a baby?" he cried.
"Nor have I. Ten years ago, almost to a day, I sailed from Boston to Europe with my people, and I had never revisited New York after leaving it in infancy, though both my father and mother hailed from the Bronx."
"There's a cog missing somewhere, or my mental gear-box is out of shape."
"Not a bit of it. One may learn heaps of things from maps and books."
"Start right in, then, and take an honors course, for behold in me a map and a book and a high-grade society index for the whole blessed little island of Manhattan."
"Thank you. What is that slender, column-like structure to the left of the Singer Building?"
Devar gazed hard at the graceful tower indicated by his friend; then he laughed.