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.
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