Who They Are, Whence They Come,
And Why They Are So Unlike That Other Race Of Women Of Which I Have
Spoken, You Will Settle For Yourself.
Do we not all say of our
chance acquaintances, after half an hour's conversation, nay, after
half an hour spent in the same room without conversation, that this
woman is a lady, and that that other woman is not?
They jostle
each other even among us, but never seem to mix. They are closely
allied; but neither imbues the other with her attributes. Both
shall be equally well born, or both shall be equally ill born; but
still it is so. The contrast exists in England; but in America it
is much stronger. In England women become ladylike or vulgar. In
the States they are either charming or odious.
See that female walking down Broadway. She is not exactly such a
one as her I have attempted to describe on her entrance into the
street car; for this lady is well dressed, if fine clothes will
make well dressing. The machinery of her hoops is not battered,
and altogether she is a personage much more distinguished in all
her expenditures. But yet she is a copy of the other woman. Look
at the train which she drags behind her over the dirty pavement,
where dogs have been, and chewers of tobacco, and everything
concerned with filth except a scavenger. At every hundred yards
some unhappy man treads upon the silken swab which she trails
behind her - loosening it dreadfully at the girth one would say; and
then see the style of face and the expression of features with
which she accepts the sinner's half muttered apology. The world,
she supposes, owes her everything because of her silken train, even
room enough in a crowded thoroughfare to drag it along unmolested.
But, according to her theory, she owes the world nothing in return.
She is a woman with perhaps a hundred dollars on her back, and
having done the world the honor of wearing them in the world's
presence, expects to be repaid by the world's homage and chivalry.
But chivalry owes her nothing - nothing, though she walk about
beneath a hundred times a hundred dollars - nothing, even though she
be a woman. Let every woman learn this, that chivalry owes her
nothing unless she also acknowledges her debt to chivalry. She
must acknowledge it and pay it; and then chivalry will not be
backward in making good her claims upon it.
All this has come of the street cars. But as it was necessary that
I should say it somewhere, it is as well said on that subject as on
any other. And now to continue with the street cars. They run, as
I have said, the length of the town, taking parallel lines. They
will take you from the Astor House, near the bottom of the town,
for miles and miles northward - half way up the Hudson River - for, I
believe, five pence. They are very slow, averaging about five
miles an hour; but they are very sure. For regular inhabitants,
who have to travel five or six miles perhaps to their daily work,
they are excellent. I have nothing really to say against the
street cars. But they do not fill the place of cabs.
There are, however, public carriages - roomy vehicles, dragged by
two horses, clean and nice, and very well suited to ladies visiting
the city. But they have none of the attributes of the cab. As a
rule, they are not to be found standing about. They are very slow.
They are very dear. A dollar an hour is the regular charge; but
one cannot regulate one's motion by the hour. Going out to dinner
and back costs two dollars, over a distance which in London would
cost two shillings. As a rule, the cost is four times that of a
cab, and the rapidity half that of a cab. Under these
circumstances, I think I am justified in saying that there is no
mode of getting about in New York to see anything.
And now as to the other charge against New York, of there being
nothing to see. How should there be anything there to see of
general interest? In other large cities - cities as large in name
as New York - there are works of art, fine buildings, ruins, ancient
churches, picturesque costumes, and the tombs of celebrated men.
But in New York there are none of these things. Art has not yet
grown up there. One or two fine figures by Crawford are in the
town, especially that of the Sorrowing Indian, at the rooms of the
Historical Society; but art is a luxury in a city which follows but
slowly on the heels of wealth and civilization. Of fine buildings -
which, indeed, are comprised in art - there are none deserving
special praise or remark. It might well have been that New York
should ere this have graced herself with something grand in
architecture; but she has not done so. Some good architectural
effect there is, and much architectural comfort. Of ruins, of
course, there can be none - none, at least, of such ruins as
travelers admire, though perhaps some of that sort which disgraces
rather than decorates. Churches there are plenty, but none that
are ancient. The costume is the same as our own; and I need hardly
say that it is not picturesque. And the time for the tombs of
celebrated men has not yet come. A great man's ashes are hardly of
value till they have all but ceased to exist.
The visitor to New York must seek his gratification and obtain his
instruction from the habits and manners of men. The American,
though he dresses like an Englishman, and eats roast beef with a
silver fork - or sometimes with a steel knife - as does an
Englishman, is not like an Englishman in his mind, in his
aspirations, in his tastes, or in his politics.
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