Pawtucket Gazette And Chronicle

New York, Sept. 1, 1852.
Friend Sherman,—Once more am I here in this famed city of Gotham. Once more do I tread its crowded streets, and behold its splendor and its degradation, its wealth and its poverty, its prosperity and its misery. Where else in the world can you find a greater contrast between extremes than here—where a greater variety in conditions in life, in morals, in hopes and prospects? To the hopes of how many an ambitious and aspiring youth has this city been the grave! Where one succeeds who comes here without friends to counsel and assist, probably fifty fail. There is no community of feeling here. Every body seems to mind his own business most severely and pertinaciously.

The splendor and vastness of all undertakings here make the resident of a country village feel small. However important he may feel at home, a short sojourn here will reduce his estimate of his own consequence amazingly. No matter what may be his calling, he will find it carried out here on a scale so much greater than he has dreamed of, that he will come to the conclusion that he has been a very little man and doing a very little business.

I find New York very much as it used to be in general, but very much unlike its former self in particular. Here are the Battery, the Park, the Astor House, Trinity Church, Broadway and the Bowery, and other well-known landmarks, but the filling up has changed. On landing, instinctively wended my way to Park Row, not doubting but I should find familiar faces there, and, well-remembered places of resort. Alas! I found neither. The Park Theatre, where I have seen many a distinguished actor and actress strut his and her hour upon the stage, is gone, and so have Smith and his hotel—a place where, in days gone by, hosts of jovial fellows used to congregate—patrons of the turf and the drama. And those lunches, they, too, are gone—the "Cornucopia," the "Atheneum," the "Shakspeare," &c., where such stews and steaks, such broils and fries were dispensed to the hungry, and such—but no matter—the Maine Law had not then been invented. In the place of all these once familiar objects stands one of the most splendid blocks of stores in the world. Where the former business men of Park Row have gone nobody here can inform me. They were a few years ago noted throughout the city, and now they have passed into oblivion. Nobody ever heard of them, and I can see nobody here that I ever saw before. What changes time effects in this changing world.

To me, one of the most interesting things in New York is the markets, and I never permit a favorable opportunity to visit them to escape. As soon as I had disposed of my baggage on the morning of my landing, I took a walk to Washington Market, which is on the North River, nearly west from the Astor House. There I found, as formerly, probably one of the most attractive and extensive displays of fruits, vegetables, meat, fish, poultry, &c., that can be found in the country. It is fortunate for the venders that they have a great number of mouths to supply; had they not, they would be heavy losers by the perishing of their perishable commodities. No one who visits New York ought to neglect to visit Washington Market in the morning. People in New England can form no idea of the quality of the fruit raised in this vicinity from the specimens that are sent east. The Gothamites keep all the best for their own use, and send the inferior qualities to the Yankees. By the way, I never go into a New York fish market without stopping to see the occupants get quahaugs out of the shell. The rapidity with which they do it is astonishing, and the most skilful Yankees in such matters would own beat without a trial. But you set a New Yorker to work getting out oysters, and a Yankee will beat him more than half. The former can open a quahaug in the twinkling of an eye without breaking the shell in the least, but if he gets hold of an oyster, he must pound it for a long time before he can get the knife between the shells.

I was much struck with the manner in which the government of this city is administered. Unfavorably as I thought of it, I witnessed something on Saturday that placed it still lower in my estimation. While riding up Broadway about eight o'clock in the morning, I saw, opposite the Park and in front of one of the splendid stores in that neighborhood, and within a stone's throw of the Astor House, a horse lying in the gutter, apparently in the agonies of death. He had evidently been harnessed to one of those horse-killing machines called omnibuses until he became too weak to stand, and falling in the street the harness was taken from him, and he was dragged out of the way into the gutter. I supposed that some "good samaritan" would knock him in head and remove him without delay, but on my return about one o'clock in the afternoon the poor brute was still lying there and struggling in the agonies of death. His head, which he was unable to raise, was partly immersed in filthy water, and a swarm of flies was devouring his eyes. His back lay against the curb stone, and in his struggles he had worn the skin and flesh from it; and the pavement was covered with blood that flowed from his lacerated limbs. A more painful and disgusting sight I have rarely beheld, yet nobody save a few boys took any notice of it. The conduct of one of these boys showed that he has got a heart in the right place. Pitying the poor animal that lay struggling and quivering before him, he went over to the Park and gathered some grass, and tried to make him eat it; failing in this, he humanely brushed the flies from the horse's eyes and wounds. At a later hour in the afternoon the horse still lay there alive, but between that time and Sunday at eleven o'clock he was removed, by whom I know not. The creature who owned him must be an unfeeling wretch, and the city government must be lost to a sense of decency to permit such a sight to disfigure Broadway for so long a time. Does any one suppose that such an object would be permitted to remain an hour in Washington street, Boston!

I have been in New York a great deal from time to time, but never did I see the city look so clean and inviting as it did yesterday morning. On the previous afternoon, at about five o'clock, it commenced raining here in torrents, and continued, with brief intermissions, until the next morning. Everybody admits that he never saw the city so thoroughly purified before. Its filthiest quarters that were accessible to the storm, were washed and cleansed. There was a high wind during the rain, and unfinished buildings, chimneys, trees, &c., were prostrated.

What a contrast there is between Broadway on Sunday and any other day in the week. On Saturday it was alive with vehicles of all kinds, and the pedestrian who crossed it did so at the peril of his bones if not of his life. Omnibuses, drays, hacks, private carriages, hand carts, &c., rushed madly in every direction and sometimes they would get into such an inextricable snarl for a quarter of a mile in extent that the whole would be brought to a stand still, and apparently so dovetailed together that they could never be separated except by lifting some over the others. But yesterday the omnibuses and drays were missing, and but few hacks were seen; and the owners of "fast" horses and light and graceful vehicles availed themselves of the opportunity to show off the quality of their establishments in the most splendid thoroughfare in America.

The "Maine Law" does not operate at all in New York yet. If it is destined ever to be enacted and enforced in this State, I want to be here on the day when it first goes into operation. If there is any thing of which the Gothamites are thoroughly convinced, it is that they have a right—an "inalienable and indefeasible right"—to sell and drink rum; and they regard everything that is said to the contrary as the ravings of lunatics—very much as they do the notions of the Millerites about the world's coming to an end. Nothing short of the shutting up of the bar-rooms can begin to beat into their heads the idea that there is any thing worthy of a moment's notice in the Maine Law fever, and when that is done, "may I be here to see."

By the way, speaking of the Maine Law reminds me that the authorities of the neighboring city of Brooklyn have been trying to enforce a miniature edition of it—that is, an ordinance shutting up the bar-rooms of the licensed tavern-keepers in that city on Sunday. A refusal to submit to this ordinance was followed by several arrests of traffickers. The liquor dealers appealed to one of the Justices of the Supreme Court for protection, and that functionary issued an injunction restraining the enforcement of the ordinance until the question of its constitutionality shall be decided. The petitioners for the injunction set forth that the ordinance is unconstitutional, prevents them from exercising their lawful calling as tavern keepers, and deprives them of the means of supporting themselves and families.

Yours truly,
TYPO.