Generally The Best Of These Houses
Are Owned By Those Who Live In Them, And Rent Is Not, Therefore,
Paid.
But this is not always the case, and the sums named above
may be taken as expressing their value.
In England a man should
have a very large income indeed who could afford to pay 1000 pounds
a year for his house in London. Such a one would as a matter of
course have an establishment in the country, and be an earl, or a
duke, or a millionaire. But it is different in New York. The
resident there shows his wealth chiefly by his house; and though he
may probably have a villa at Newport or a box somewhere up the
Hudson, he has no second establishment. Such a house, therefore,
will not represent a total expenditure of above 4000 pounds a year.
There are churches on each side of Fifth Avenue - perhaps five or
six within sight at one time - which add much to the beauty of the
street. They are well built, and in fairly good taste. These,
added to the general well-being and splendid comfort of the place,
give it an effect better than the architecture of the individual
houses would seem to warrant. I own that I have enjoyed the vista
as I have walked up and down Fifth Avenue, and have felt that the
city had a right to be proud of its wealth. But the greatness and
beauty and glory of wealth have on such occasions been all in all
with me. I know no great man, no celebrated statesman, no
philanthropist of peculiar note who has lived in Fifth Avenue.
That gentleman on the right made a million of dollars by inventing
a shirt collar; this one on the left electrified the world by a
lotion; as to the gentleman at the corner there, there are rumors
about him and the Cuban slave trade but my informant by no means
knows that they are true. Such are the aristocracy of Fifth
Avenue, I can only say that, if I could make a million dollars by a
lotion, I should certainly be right to live in such a house as one
of those.
The suburbs of New York are, by the nature of the localities,
divided from the city by water. Jersey City and Hoboken are on the
other side of the Hudson, and in another State. Williamsburg and
Brooklyn are on Long Island, which is a part of the State of New
York. But these places are as easily reached as Lambeth is reached
from Westminster. Steam ferries ply every three or four minutes;
and into these boats coaches, carts, and wagons of any size or
weight are driven. In fact, they make no other stoppage to the
commerce than that occasioned by the payment of a few cents. Such
payment, no doubt, is a stoppage; and therefore it is that Jersey
City, Brooklyn, and Williamsburg are, at any rate in appearance,
very dull and uninviting. They are, however, very populous. Many
of the quieter citizens prefer to live there; and I am told that
the Brooklyn tea parties consider themselves to be, in esthetic
feeling, very much ahead of anything of the kind in the more
opulent centers of the city. In beauty of scenery Staten Island is
very much the prettiest of the suburbs of New York. The view from
the hillside in Staten Island down upon New York harbor is very
lovely. It is the only really good view of that magnificent harbor
which I have been able to find. As for appreciating such beauty
when one is entering a port from sea or leaving it for sea, I do
not believe in any such power. The ship creeps up or creeps out
while the mind is engaged on other matters. The passenger is
uneasy either with hopes or fears, and then the grease of the
engines offends one's nostrils. But it is worth the tourist's
while to look down upon New York harbor from the hillside in Staten
Island. When I was there Fort Lafayette looked black in the center
of the channel, and we knew that it was crowded with the victims of
secession. Fort Tompkins was being built to guard the pass - worthy
of a name of richer sound; and Fort something else was bristling
with new cannon. Fort Hamilton, on Long Island, opposite, was
frowning at us; and immediately around us a regiment of volunteers
was receiving regimental stocks and boots from the hands of its
officers. Everything was bristling with war; and one could not but
think that not in this way had New York raised herself so quickly
to her present greatness.
But the glory of New York is the Central Park - its glory in the
minds of all new Yorkers of the present day. The first question
asked of you is whether you have seen the Central Park, and the
second is as to what you think of it. It does not do to say simply
that it is fine, grand, beautiful, and miraculous. You must swear
by cock and pie that it is more fine, more grand, more beautiful,
more miraculous than anything else of the kind anywhere. Here you
encounter in its most annoying form that necessity for eulogium
which presses you everywhere. For in truth, taken as it is at
present, the Central Park is not fine, nor grand, nor beautiful.
As to the miracle, let that pass. It is perhaps as miraculous as
some other great latter-day miracles.
But the Central Park is a very great fact, and affords a strong
additional proof of the sense and energy of the people. It is very
large, being over three miles long and about three-quarters of a
mile in breadth. When it was found that New York was extending
itself, and becoming one of the largest cities of the world, a
space was selected between Fifth and Seventh Avenues, immediately
outside the limits of the city as then built, but nearly in the
center of the city as it is intended to be built.
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