New York: Canap

Of all the hostile environments that have challenged the fortitude of man, few have proved so obdurately unconquerable as one that he created for himself — the 23 sq. mi. of Manhattan. In the past two years alone, the metropolis has undergone ordeal by blackout, smog, race riot, drought, blizzard, transit strike and about every other affliction that can visit a city. Last week 250,-000 long-suffering Manhattanites were subjected to a new kind of hazard: trial by garbage and stairway. As usual, they responded with inventiveness, insouciance and ire.

The latest crisis was...