The Englishwoman in America, Isabella Lucy Bird [top 10 books of all time txt] 📗

and wild-vine hang in graceful drapery from base to summit, and the dark mountain shadows loom over the lake-like expanse below. The hand wearies of writing of the loveliness of this river. I saw it on a perfect day. The Indian summer lingered, as though unwilling that the chilly blasts of winter should blight the loveliness of this beauteous scene. The gloom of autumn was not there, but its glories were on every leaf and twig. The bright scarlet of the maple vied with the brilliant berries of the rowan, and from among the tendrils of the creepers, which were waving in the sighs of the west wind, peeped forth the deep crimson of the sumach. There were very few signs of cultivation; the banks of the Hudson are barren in all but beauty. The river is a succession of small wild lakes, connected by narrow reaches, bound for ever between abrupt precipices. There are lakes more beauteous than Loch Katrine, softer in their features than Loch Achray, though like both, or like the waters which glitter beneath the blue sky of Italy. Along their margins the woods hung in scarlet and gold--high above towered the purple peaks--the blue waters flashed back the rays of a sun shining from an unclouded sky--the air was warm like June--and I think the sunbeams of that day scarcely shone upon a fairer scene. At mid-day the Highlands of Hudson were left behind--the mountains melted into hills--the river expanded into a noble stream about a mile in width--the scarlet woods, the silvery lakes, and the majestic Catsgills faded away in the distance; and with a whoop, and a roar, and a clatter, the cars entered into, and proceeded at slackened speed down, a long street called Tenth Avenue, among carts, children, and pigs.

True enough, we were in New York, the western receptacle not only of the traveller and the energetic merchant, but of the destitute, the friendless, the vagabond, and in short of all the outpourings of Europe, who here form a conglomerate mass of evil, making America responsible for their vices and their crimes. Yet the usual signs of approach to an enormous city were awanting--dwarfed trees, market-gardens, cockney arbours, in which citizens smoke their pipes in the evening, and imagine themselves in Arcadia, rows of small houses, and a murky canopy of smoke. We had steamed down Tenth Avenue for two or three miles, when we came to a standstill where several streets met. The train was taken to pieces, and to each car four horses or mules were attached, which took us for some distance into the very heart of the town, racing apparently with omnibuses and carriages, till at last we were deposited in Chambers Street, not in a station, or even under cover, be it observed. My baggage, or "plunder" as it is termed, had been previously disposed of, but, while waiting with my head disagreeably near to a horse's nose, I saw people making distracted attempts, and futile ones as it appeared, to preserve their effects from the clutches of numerous porters, many of them probably thieves. To judge from appearances, many people would mourn the loss of their portmanteaus that night.

New York deserves the name applied to Washington, "the city of magnificent distances." I drove in a hack for three miles to my destination, along crowded, handsome streets, but I believe that I only traversed a third part of the city.

It possesses the features of many different lands, but it has characteristics peculiarly its own; and as with its suburbs it may almost bear the name of the "million-peopled city," and as its growing influence and importance have earned it the name of the Empire City, I need not apologise for dwelling at some length upon it in the succeeding chapter.



CHAPTER XVI.

Position of New York--Externals of the city--Conveyances-- Maladministration--The stores--The hotels--Curiosities of the hospital-- Ragged schools--The bad book--Monster schools--Amusements and oyster saloons--Monstrosities--A restaurant--Dwelling-houses--Equipages--Palaces --Dress--Figures--Manners--Education--Domestic habits--The ladies--The gentlemen--Society--Receptions--Anti-English feeling--Autographs--The "Buckram Englishman."

New York, from its position, population, influence, and commerce, is worthy to be considered the metropolis of the New World. The situation of it is very advantageous. It is built upon Manhattan Island, which is about thirteen miles in length by two in breadth. It has the narrowest portion of Long Island Sound, called East River, on its east side; the Hudson, called the North River, environs it in another direction; while these two are connected by a narrow strait, principally artificial, denominated the Harlem River. This insular position of the city is by no means intelligible to the stranger, but it is obvious from the top of any elevated building. The dense part of New York already covers a large portion of the island; and as it _daily_ extends northward, the whole extent of insulated ground is divided into lots, and mapped out into streets.

But, not content with covering the island, which, when Hendrick Hudson first discovered it, abounded with red men, who fished along its banks and guided their bark canoes over the surrounding waters, New York, under the names of Brooklyn, Williamsburgh, and four or five others, has spread itself on Long Island, Staten Island, and the banks of the Hudson. Brooklyn, on Long Island, which occupies the same position with regard to New York that Lambeth and Southwark do to London, contains a population of 100,000 souls. Brooklyn, Williamsburgh, Hoboken, and Jersey City are the residences of a very large portion of the merchants of New York, who have deserted the old or Dutch part of the town, which is consequently merely an aggregate of offices. Floating platforms, moved by steam, with space in the middle part for twelve or fourteen carriages and horses, and luxurious covered apartments, heated with steam-pipes on either side, ply to and fro every five minutes at the small charge of one halfpenny a passenger, and the time occupied in crossing the ferries is often less than that of the detention on Westminster Bridge. Besides these large places, Staten Island and Long Island are covered with villa residences. Including these towns, which are in reality part of this vast city, New York contains a population of very nearly a million! Broadway, which is one of the most remarkable streets in the world, being at once the Corso, Toledo, Regent Street, and Princes Street of New York, runs along the centre of the city, and is crossed at right angles by innumerable streets, which run down to the water at each side. It would appear as if the inventive genius of the people had been exhausted, for, after borrowing designations for their streets from every part of the world, among which some of the old Dutch names figure most refreshingly, they have adopted the novel plan of numbering them. Thus there are ten "Avenues," which run from north to south, and these are crossed by streets numbered First Street, Second Street, and so on. I believe that the skeletons of one hundred and fifty numbered streets are in existence. The southern part of the town still contains a few of the old Dutch houses, and there are some substantial red-brick villas in the vicinity, inhabited by the descendants of the old Dutch families, who are remarkably exclusive in their habits.

New York is decidedly a very handsome city. The wooden houses have nearly all disappeared, together with those of an antiquated or incongruous appearance; and the new streets are very regularly and substantially built of brown stone or dark brick. The brick building in New York is remarkably beautiful. The windows are large, and of plate-glass, and the whole external finish of the houses is in a splendid but chaste style, never to be met with in street-architecture in England. As the houses in the city are almost universally heated by air warmed by a subterranean stove, very few chimneys are required, and these are seldom visible above the stone parapets which conceal the roofs. Anthracite coal is almost universally used, so there is an absence of that murky, yellow canopy which disfigures English towns. The atmosphere is remarkably dry, so that even white marble edifices, of which there are several in the town, suffer but little from the effects of climate.

Broadway is well paved, and many of the numbered streets are not to be complained of in this respect, but a great part of the city is indescribably dirty, though it is stated that the expense of cleaning it exceeds 250,000 dollars per annum. Its immense length necessitates an enormous number of conveyances; and in order to obviate the obstruction to traffic which would have been caused by providing omnibus accommodation equal to the demand, the authorities have consented to a most alarming inroad upon several of the principal streets. The stranger sees with surprise that double lines of rails are laid along the roadways; and while driving quietly in a carriage, he hears the sound of a warning bell, and presently a railway-car, holding thirty persons, and drawn by two or four horses, comes thundering down the street. These rail-cars run every few minutes, and the fares are very low. For very sufficient reasons, Broadway is not thus encroached upon; and a journey from one end to the other of this marvellous street is a work of time and difficulty. Pack the traffic of the Strand and Cheapside into Oxford Street, and still you will not have an idea of the crush in Broadway. There are streams of scarlet and yellow omnibuses racing in the more open parts, and locking each other's wheels in the narrower--there are helpless females deposited in the middle of a sea of slippery mud, condemned to run a gauntlet between cart-wheels and horses' hoofs--there are loaded stages hastening to and from the huge hotels--carts and waggons laden with merchandise--and "Young Americans" driving fast-trotting horses, edging in and out among the crowd--wheels are locked, horses tumble down, and persons pressed for time are distracted. Occasionally, the whole traffic of the street comes to a dead- lock, in consequence of some obstruction or crowd, there being no policeman at hand with his incessant command, "_Move on_!"

The hackney-carriages of New York are very handsome, and, being drawn by two horses, have the appearance of private equipages; but woe to the stranger who trusts to the inviting announcement that the fare is a dollar within a certain circle. Bad as London cabmen are, one would welcome the sight of one of them. The New York hackmen are licensed plunderers, against whose extortions there is neither remedy nor appeal. They are generally Irish, and cheat people with unblushing audacity. The omnibus or stage accommodation is plentiful and excellent. A person soon becomes accustomed to, and enjoys, the occasional excitement of locked wheels or a race, and these vehicles are roomy and clean. They are sixteen inches wider than our own omnibuses, and carry a number of passengers certainly within their capabilities, and the fares are fixed and very low, 6-1/2 cents for any distance. They have windows to the sides and front, and the spaces between are painted with very tolerably-executed landscapes. There is no conductor; the driver opens and closes the door with a strap, and the money is handed to him through a little hole in the roof. The lady passengers invariably give the money to a gentleman for this purpose, and no rule of etiquette is more rigidly enforced than for him to obey the request to do so, generally consisting in a haughty wave of the hand. The thousand acts of attention which gentlemen, by rigid usage, are compelled to tender to ladies, are received by them without the slightest acknowledgment, either by word or gesture. To so great an extent is this _nonchalance_ carried on the part of the females, that two or three newspapers have seriously taken up