In Concluding This Brief And Incomplete
Account Of New York, I May Be Allowed To Refer To The Preface Of
This
work, and repeat that any descriptions which I have given of things or
society are merely "sketches," and, as
Such, are liable to the errors
which always attend upon hasty observation.
New York, with its novel, varied, and ever-changing features, is
calculated to leave a very marked impression on a stranger's mind. In one
part one can suppose it to be a negro town; in another, a German city;
while a strange dreamy resemblance to Liverpool pervades the whole. In it
there is little repose for the mind, and less for the eye, except on the
Sabbath-day, which is very well observed, considering the widely-differing
creeds and nationalities of the inhabitants. The streets are alive with
business, retail and wholesale, and present an aspect of universal bustle.
Flags are to be seen in every direction, the tall masts of ships appear
above the houses; large square pieces of calico, with names in scarlet or
black letters upon them, hang across the streets, to denote the
whereabouts of some popular candidate or "puffing" storekeeper; and hosts
of omnibuses, hacks, drays, and railway cars at full speed, ringing bells,
terrify unaccustomed foot-passengers. There are stores of the magnitude of
bazaars, "daguerrean galleries" by hundreds, crowded groggeries and
subterranean oyster-saloons, huge hotels, coffee-houses, and places of
amusement; while the pavements present men of every land and colour, red,
black, yellow, and white, in every variety of costume and beard, and
ladies, beautiful and ugly, richly dressed. Then there are mud huts, and
palatial residences, and streets of stately dwelling-houses, shaded by
avenues of ilanthus-trees; waggons discharging goods across the pavements;
shops above and cellars below; railway whistles and steamboat bells,
telegraph-wires, eight and ten to a post, all converging towards Wall
Street - the Lombard Street of New York; militia regiments in many-coloured
uniforms, marching in and out of the city all day; groups of emigrants
bewildered and amazed, emaciated with dysentery and sea-sickness, looking
in at the shop-windows; representatives of every nation under heaven,
speaking in all earth's Babel languages; and as if to render this
ceaseless pageant of business, gaiety, and change, as far removed from
monotony as possible, the quick toll of the fire alarm-bells may be daily
heard, and the huge engines, with their burnished equipments and well-
trained companies, may be seen to dash at full speed along the streets to
the scene of some brilliant conflagration. New York is calculated to
present as imposing an appearance to an Englishman as its antiquated
namesake does to an American, with its age, silence, stateliness, and
decay.
The Indian summer had come and gone, and bright frosty weather had
succeeded it, when I left this city, in which I had received kindness and
hospitality which I can never forget. Mr. Amy, the kind friend who had
first welcomed me to the States, was my travelling companion, and at his
house near Boston, in the midst of a happy family-circle, I spent the
short remnant of my time before returning to England.
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